I $ 

■ 1 









































COWfRlGttT DEPOSE 



































BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 














/ — • 

BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

BY 

LESLIE PARKER 

< * 


*8 


^1.65 

C. F. FRASER CO. 

PUBLISHERS 
BROOKLYN, NEW YORK 
1924 









* • 


1 •*.<* 


COPYRIGHT, 1924, BY 

PARKER ELLIS J 

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED 

PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES 
AT 

THE COUNTRY LIFE PRESS, GARDEN CITY, If • Y. 

First Edition 

m 29 w 

©C1A80062 2 
Mu *V 




CONTENTS 


CHAPTER PAGE 

I. Big Jim and Mary . i 

II. “We Will be Christians”.22 

III. A Country Church Pentecost .... 41 

IV. Big Jim and Lew Delker Clash .... 50 

V. Happily Wedded. 63 

VI. The Americanization School .... 81 

VII. The Melting Pot Boiling.93 

VIII. An Old Fashioned Country Sunday- 

School .112 

IX. Picnic on Puget Sound .119 

X. The Siwash in His War Canoe .,.141 

XI. Lew Delker Sells His Soul.166 

XII. Love’s Tragedy. 174 

XIII. The Bootlegger Rouses the Country . . 192 

XIV. Lew Delker Plays Politics.203 

XV. Big Jim is Pushed to the Front .... 215 

XVI. A Trip Through Crime Land .... 227 

XVII. “How Can We Beat Big Jim?” 

V 


. 259 










vi 

CHAPTER 

CONTENTS' 

PAGE 

XVIII. 

Jim and Mary Politically Crucified 

297 

XIX. 

The Plotters Blown Up At the Trial . 

313 

XX. 

Legal Side Stepping . 

364 

XXI. 

Louise Fights Dope With Prayer 

370 

XXII. 

Lew Delker Boasts. 

383 

XXIII. 

Personal Liberty and The Law Fight to 
a Finish. Lew Delker to the Peniten¬ 



tiary—Big Jim to the Governorship . 

387 



BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 













BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

CHAPTER I 

B IG JIM ALBRIGHT, twenty-three, was a Puget 
Sound boy, born near the sea. He was six feet 
three and looked it. If there was any weakness any¬ 
where about his blond makeup it didn’t show. Mary Mor¬ 
ton, twenty, was a Puget Sound country girl. She was blonde, 
too, and pretty; clear creamy skinned, brown eyed, and 
lustrous haired. Jim’s father, Judge James Albright, owned 
a farm in the extreme northwestern district of the United 
States. He was Justice of the Peace and was called Judge be¬ 
cause in the far western country everything in the judicial line 
or of seemingly judicial calibre after reaching a certain age 
and standing in the community is called Judge or Colonel. 
Mary’s father, John Morton, also owned a farm, next to 
Judge Albright’s. Jim was an only son and Mary afl only 
daughter. 

Big Jim and Mary were out walking together on a June 
evening thoroughly enjoying their own companionship, 
which was very exclusive, and the Puget Sound air and scen¬ 
ery. That means a good deal, for Puget Sound from June 
first to October fifteenth is the garden of the world, a paradise 
in climate, a luxuriant lotus land where big men and big 
women live, satisfied with the life that comes to them day by 
day. 

There is no other climate on all the earth like that of Puget 
Sound in the calm and delightful summertime. The sunny 
resorts of Italy are cold and cheerless and changeful compared 
to Puget Sound’s summer days; there is a little somnolent 


2 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

heat at times and a few chilly mornings where the radiant 
sun of California draws tourists from all the corners of the 
earth; the Isles of Greece with their clustering grapes, the 
Mediterranean shores of France with their villas and chateaux 
and their graceful people living their graceful lives; the hill¬ 
sides of Japan, white blossomed and fragrant like the homes 
of the gods, all have their drawbacks, but Puget Sound in 
summertime is the perfect place. It has a summer climate 
that blends the north and the south. There is unexampled 
vigor in the salt and iodine breeze that sweeps three thou¬ 
sand miles across the Pacific; there is bracing vigor in the 
clear cool air that comes from the eastern borderline of giant 
mountains with their snow-capped peaks; there is vigor in the 
calm air of the calm day and the calm night; the day is never 
hot and the hours of sleep are never cold. It is pleasant from 
the time the sun goes down till he rises again in a far western 
imperial splendor. The invalid who cannot sleep through 
the nights of Puget Sound cannot sleep anywhere on earth; 
nature could do no more for invalid or athlete. The quiet 
sunshine of the perfect day, the balsam balm of the perfect 
night, the mountains, the forests, the rivers, the great ocean 
—it is Utopia realized. 

And this great, calm, peaceful Pacific Ocean is guarding 
and watching this Utopia as it has guarded and watched it 
for the tens of millions of years in the long past. Through the 
cold waters of that immense ocean there runs a river of warm 
life. It is a blessed river. Its waters are tepid. It might 
be the bathing pool of all the mermaids of all the western 
seas. We can fancy we see them disporting there and as they 
revel in the warmth and play their games, gliding hither and 
thither, we can see them shudder and draw hastily back as 
they touch the cold walls of the waters that surround this 
marvelous river of hallowed contentment. It welcomes with 
cheer and good will and luxurious comfort the chilled sailor 
boys who come shivering to its cleavage line and urges them 
to throw off their woolens and their heavy clothes and stretch 
themselves to doze in the long restful sleep that they have 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 3 

dreamed of through their voyage. Its mists are the advance 
guard of old winter’s enemies; they fling defiance in the face 
of frost and ice and invite the glacier and the iceberg to float 
gently into the stream and warm their heart of hearts. It 
radiates verdure; every shore it touches or reaches with its 
occult influence is green and wooded and grassed; the ferns 
are like little trees in its domain, and the trees that are mir¬ 
rored in the blue waters are the most splendid giants of all the 
forests of all the world. It is the guardian spirit, the angel 
of life of an elysian land, and it claims this one favored region 
for its own special kingdom—a kingdom that endows its 
blonde people with bigness and breadth and vision. The 
little thing of man or mountain or forest or ocean finds no 
place here. Size and strength and grandeur and beauty are 
nature’s natural expression on Puget Sound. 

The soft influences of this river of life winds in and out 
among wooded islands all along the ocean front of Puget 
Sound. These islands are nature’s floating fortresses. The 
harsh winds and the burly waves cannot buffet and browbeat 
the long mainland. They have to be peaceful, for the islands 
are interlocked breastworks, the line of defence that subdues 
their arrogance and blustriness and they come to the shore¬ 
line only with balmy messages of good will and friendly 
friendship. These islands have mountains for neighbors 
that tower above the snow line through all the year, and 
rivers that carry the pure snow water long distances from the 
mountains to the sea—rivers that are sounding the invitation 
by day and by night to the humanity around to place their 
steel towers and runways along their banks and they will 
furnish power to run all the mills and factories of the Ameri¬ 
can western world for all the years to come. 

Jim and Mary with their health and strength and youth and 
intelligence fitted into the rural scene around them as if to the 
manor born. They had always known each other and they 
had strolled out this evening as they had often done before 
along the river bank that separated their homes. A big fir 
tree had been undermined by the river and had blown over 


4 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

and carried a smaller fir with it. They sat down on the 
smaller tree and leaned back against the big tree and looked 
across the stream through the evening sunshine of their shel¬ 
tered cove. 

They had been silent for some time. Their conversation 
had been of the commonplace variety, about the affairs of 
the two farms, and the neighborhood gossip. After a silence 
Jim reached over and placed his long arm around Mary and 
drew her toward him and seated her squarely on his knee. 
Then he placed his two big hands on each side of her cheeks 
and looked into her surprised eyes and said: “Look here, little 
girl, I love you better than life. I don’t think of anything 
else from the time I wake up in the morning till I go to sleep 
at night but just you. You’re all there is in the world to me. 
We’re going to get married right away, just you and me and 
no one else, and we’re going to live for the rest of our lives in 
our own little world. There isn’t going to be another soul 
in that little world but just you and me. I will make a home 
for us two and you can keep it and we can go on loving each 
other just as much as we want to—and that’s going to be an 
immense amount on my side of the fence. We’ll go right 
down and tell your Dad and Mama and then we’ll go right 
over and tell my Dad and Mama and have it all over with to¬ 
night and we’ll go right about getting married without any 
fiddle-dee-dee delay and frum frums. I’m for getting mar¬ 
ried at nine to-morrow morning and going to housekeeping 
at two to-morrow afternoon. Now what do you say, little 
girl? And don’t you dare to say anything else but yes to all 
I have said is going to happen. Say yes, now, quick, and 
have it over with.” 

Mary was little more than a schoolgirl, and although the 
thought had come to her in the past at times that she and Jim 
might get married it was something that had always seemed 
far away in the very distant future, a vague though pleasant 
possibility. The action and words of her resolute lover took 
her breath away and for an instant she could find no answer. 

“Say yes, little girl, or I’ll go right away and throw myself 


5 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

in the river before your very eyes where the water is all of a 
foot deep. You don’t want me to drown myself on a sandbar 
in a river that won’t cover me all over, do you? I should 
have waited till the fall and then I could have floated past on 
the silvery tide in the floods and waved a long farewell to you 
just before I went down for the last time. But I can’t do 
that now when the water is so low. Say yes, little girl, or 
just nod your head; that will do just as well as golden speech. 
There, you’ve nodded all right, and now we’ll kiss and bind 
the bargain, not once, but about sixteen times, to make up 
for all the times we should have kissed in the past but didn’t.” 

True enough, Mary had nodded, for Jim had a hand on each 
cheek and he had nodded her head for her, but she acquiesced 
by saying: “Oh, Jim,” and putting her arms around his neck 
while he kissed her again and again. 

“There, now,” said Jim, “it’s all settled and there’s nothing 
further except for the preacher to say his few words, and we’ll 
have him say them in the near future. Now I’ll leave the 
time of the ceremony all to you, and see that you make the 
wedding day a closeup, as they say in the movies.” 

“Jim,” she said, as she laid her head on his shoulder and 
looked up at him, “I’m the happiest girl in the universe to¬ 
night. I’ll have to talk with Mama, though, about the exact 
day for our wedding. You know you mustn’t be so impatient 
for it’s a woman’s special prerogative to be fussy and bossy 
and tyrannical about that one day of days in her life. You 
know it comes only once and it’s the greatest day ever; but 
it won’t be so very, very long. Now where are we going to 
live? We can’t live in your home and we can’t live in ours. 
There isn’t room in either house, and—besides ” 

“Besides, no one house, even if it’s as big as the palace of 
the Romanoffs, is big enough for two families. That’s what 
you were going to say, my dear little duckling, wasn’t it?” 

“That’s just what I was thinking,” said Mary thought¬ 
fully. “My folks will want us to live with them, at least till 
we get settled; your folks will want us to live with them till we 
get settled. I think we had better strike out right at the be- 


6 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

ginning and take care of ourselves. It will be better for all 
concerned.” 

“ Right you are, dear,” said Jim. “We’ll do that very 
thing, and we can make up our minds just what we will do 
along those lines when we have talked over the matter with 
the old folks on both sides regarding our engagement. Let 
us see what they say. They may want to make some sug¬ 
gestion that will help us out. Now let us talk over some of 
the other things of this awfully responsible married life of 
ours. Do you know, little one, that Tve always had the idea 
that there’s only one successful man in all the world and he’s 
the fellow that has reached the goal of the Cotter that Burns 
describes. I’d rather be a workaday farmer with a blameless 
reputation and a well-spent honest life behind me and my 
boys and girls around me in their honest, straightforward, 
strictly moral joys and sorrows when I reach my gray-haired 
days than to be the millionaire sitting alone before my fire¬ 
place in cold, silent, solitary selfishness. I learned the ‘Cot¬ 
ter’s Saturday Night’ years and years ago. Listen to it now 
and see if it doesn’t sound good for us, for just you and me.” 
And he commenced in low, measured tones to recite the most 
beautiful word picture of Scottish life that Burns ever drew. 

“There now, little one,” he said as he finished and looked 
down at Mary, “what do you think of that? Isn’t the old 
Cotter’s family about right? And I have often thought that 
if I ever got married and started a family institution of my 
own along with my wife that the first thing I would do would 
be to join the church and to read the Scriptures and be sin¬ 
cerely religious like the old Cotter. It’s easier to start at 
the beginning than to right about face and begin halfway 
down the track. What do you say, little girl, if we go right 
up to the altar next Sunday night when Reverend Story calls 
for any one who wishes to come forward and join the church. 
You know he has the habit of saying something like that 
every service just before he dismisses the congregation. 
There hasn’t been many occasions when any one took ad¬ 
vantage of the invitation except when some stranger moved 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 7 

/ v - - 

into the neighborhood and brought his card from some other 
church.” 

“Oh, Jim, I’m so glad you think that way,” said Mary as 
she pressed her cheek closer to his. “I’ll go right up with 
you, and I’ll be so glad to be a member of the church. I’ve 
always wanted to be but it’s so hard to make the break when 
a person’s folks are not members and perhaps they might— 
well, they might think it strange, although I don’t think Dad 
or Mama would have the slightest objection to me going 
forward, even if I went alone, but it’s different with you and 
me together and I’ll make our home a real little Christian 
home. We’ll be real members of a real Christian church.” 

“That’s fine, little girl, and I’ll get a big family Bible, just 
like the old Cotter had, and we’ll begin the very first day in 
our new home by asking a blessing at every meal and having 
family prayers. The church people are going to be our kind 
of people and the Christian life our kind of life, and now we’ll 
go across the field and tell your folks all about how they’re 
going to lose you or perhaps how they’re going to add me to 
the family.” 

They started arm in arm across the meadow that lay be¬ 
tween them and Mary’s home and were making slow headway 
as they talked about the things that were of interest to them. 
Suddenly Jim became aware that something was behind 
them and half turning round he exclaimed hastily: “Run, 
run for your life! Nero is coming!” Mary didn’t need to 
be told any more. She knew Nero well, a big red four-year-old 
bull with a supposedly vicious temper. She had never ven¬ 
tured near where he was before and although she didn’t take 
time to turn her head she knew just how he looked coming full 
sweep toward them with head up in the air, angry looking 
horns tossing, and questioning eyes that had smouldering red 
blazes in them. 

Mary could run fast, as the country life had given her 
strength and swiftness of foot, and Jim was an athlete when 
circumstances called out his powers. He placed one arm 
half around the girl and they flew for the fence, but the big 


8 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

bull only increased his pace and came faster. They were 
running from him and their action only incensed him. He 
had made up his mind that he was going to catch them and 
his energetic movement showed that no doubt he would do so, 
for no man could hope to run away from a young bull if he 
called his powers of speed into play. 

Jim’s heart sank as he intuitively noted the rapid pace of 
the bull and the predicament of himself and his fiancee. 
They were still some distance from the fence. It was not the 
ordinary rail fence. John Morton had taken a great deal of 
pride that spring in building along that line an especially 
strong board fence though it was not very high. It was im¬ 
possible to jump over it and just as impossible to batter it 
down in a second of time such as Jim would have. The 
boards were turned the wrong way to kick off and he knew 
they couldn’t be pulled off quickly even if he had something 
to do it with, which he hadn’t. If he were only alone be 
could handle the bull in some way, but with Mary with him he 
realized each step that his case was getting more and more 
desperate. 

They reached the fence. The bull was right behind them, 
coming like a hurricane. To get Mary out of the way was 
Jim’s only thought. He raised her up on the final step, 
swung her clear over the top, and dropped her as gently as 
he could on the other side. “Run, run for the house!” he 
shouted as he half turned round toward the bull that was right 
at his heels. Jim instinctively saw that the big animal would 
go through the fence if he hit it at the rate he was going and 
as instinctively leaped along the fence to draw the bull after 
him. If the fence were broken down Mary might be killed. 
The bull swung after him, just barely grazing the fence that 
shook and vibrated with even the slight impact for a long dis¬ 
tance on either side. If he had hit it squarely it would surely 
have gone down. 

Jim was now rid of Mary and was more master of himself. 
Just ahead of him, leaning against the fence, was the iron 
runner of an old sled that John Morton had been using the 


9 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

winter before during the few days’ sleighing the Puget Sound 
winter afforded. It was a home-made runner hammered out 
of a bar of iron, for the natives of Puget Sound did not have 
the finished sleighs and winter vehicles of the East where 
there is a long, cold winter. Jim grasped the iron bar and 
took it with him as he leaped from the fence to dodge the bull 
and at the same time turned out into the open field to lead 
the furious animal where he would have more chance. The 
bull had his head lowered now and his nostrils were steaming 
angry snorts, as if threatening just what he would do to Jim 
in another ten seconds. He was ready to toss him in the air 
and he whirled out as Jim did and just as speedily, but the 
bull had a longer body to turn and Jim gained a few feet lee¬ 
way. He stopped suddenly and half turned round so he 
could see the bull. The bull charged with head down and 
eyes red with anger. He was quick as a cat, but Jim was 
quicker and kept his coolness of head and presence of mind in 
the emergency. He knew he had to use all his powers of 
mind and body right then to the very best advantage or he 
would be caught. With the deftness of the Spanish bull 
fighter he sidestepped the big brute and as the bull plowed 
past him ten feet before he could stop Jim measured him all 
along the side with the heavy iron bar. 

It was a terrific blow and raised a great welt from the shoul¬ 
ders to the hips and just along the shoulder and at the rump it 
cut into the flesh the depth of the bar. It made the bull 
wince and evidently put other thoughts into his head than 
that of goring Jim. But he was still determined to fight 
and began to turn. Before he could finish his turning move¬ 
ment Jim made a leap and struck him a short arm blow 
across the nose. There had been no time to draw the heavy 
bar back, but the bull’s nose is the most sensitive spot about 
his body and Jim’s short arm jolt was no light blow anyway. 
The bull let out a loud bellow of pain. The blow on the nose 
was heavy enough, although given at close range, to cause 
him to hesitate and stand still for just an instant. That was 
Jim’s opportunity. He had time to regain his balance and he 


10 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

swung the bar again along the bull’s ribs making another welt 
along his side that cut in parallel with the previous mark. 
The bull staggered. He was beaten. He couldn’t fight this 
terrible man with the iron bar and he started across the field 
with a half-crippled motion. Jim swung on him again, and 
this last blow completely broke his spirit. The fight was 
gone out of him and he was now nothing but a cowardly, 
beaten brute. When he was the victor he could be the merci¬ 
less gorer of some weak human being who was helpless before 
his far superior strength and brutality but now he was a cra¬ 
ven coward in body and soul. He bellowed as the last blow 
fell and tried as hasty flight as he could force himself to in 
order to get away from this well-merited punishment he had 
brought on himself. 

But his troubles were not ended. The folks at the house 
had seen the almost tragedy just as Jim swung Mary over the 
fence and John Morton had seized an axe and started on the 
run for the scene. Mrs. Morton also came running and 
ahead of them darted the nemesis of Nero on more than one 
occasion in the past, old Spot, the more than half bulldog 
that was one of the family and usually Mary’s constant com¬ 
panion. Spot went over the fence like a bullet, and just as 
the bull got away from the last blow from Jim’s iron bar the 
dog flashed past Jim and along the bull’s side. One dash 
more and he swung from Nero’s nose. With a quick flip, 
which the bulldog tribe seem to inherit the instinctive knowl¬ 
edge of, he turned Nero over on his side, and the big brute lay 
there prostrate and bellowing with pain and fright. The dog 
hung on, and seemed to master his giant antagonist and hold 
him down without any trouble. 

John Morton stopped at Mary’s side as the fight ended 
thus happily for the family and Mrs. Morton, white faced and 
trembling, came up a little later. “Not hurt, are you, Jim ?” 
she inquired. 

“Not a bit,” said Jim. “Nero is one fighter, though. I 
guess I’d better take Spot off. From the looks of things he’s 
settled down for all day. Enough of anything is plenty, I 


II 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

guess.” He went back and told the dog to let loose. Spot 
just turned up the whites of his eyes at him and held on. 

‘‘You’ll have to choke him off,” said John Morton. 

Jim quietly placed his big hands around Spot’s neck and 
closed down on him and tightened his grip more and more. 
The dog’s wind began to fail him. The big hands tightened 
still more. The dog gasped and his eyes closed. He let 
loose and Jim threw him off to one side. The bull staggered 
to his feet, a thoroughly beaten beast, and made off across the 
field. The dog started after him and the bull bellowed pite¬ 
ously. Jim headed Spot off and took him by the collar and 
led him back through the fence. 

By this time Mrs. Morton had ascertained that Mary had a 
sprained ankle. When Jim had dropped her over the fence 
she had landed with one foot on a hard clod which had turned 
over and all her weight had come down on the foot that was 
turned to one side. However, with Jim on one side of her 
and Mr. Morton on the other, and Mrs. Morton and Spot 
acting as convoy, they all reached the house. 

When they all had their final say about the event and Mary 
had been propped up with her ankle wrapped in a hot liniment 
preparation John Morton leaned back in his chair and said, 
“Jim, I’ve noticed something just now for the first time. 
What’s the color of your coat?” Jim looked down at it. 
He was wearing a reddish cardigan jacket, the color that 
tradition says rouses all bulls to a frenzy. “Well,” said Mr. 
Morton, “Nero had some slight excuse, looking at it from a 
bull’s standpoint, but to-morrow off come his horns. I’ve 
been going to take them off now for a year. This settles it, 
and they come off to-morrow without fail. If he doesn’t like 
red coats after this he will have to butt without horns to hurt 
any one. Now, Jim, you’ll stay for supper and I’ll ’phone 
over for the Judge and Kate to come and we’ll have a family 
party.” 

Jim looked at Mary sitting there with her ankle swathed in 
white cloths and her cheeks a trifle pale. He interpreted her 
glance as appealing to him to stay and he said: “Sure, I’ll 


12 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

stay. I’ll help you to do the chores and then I’ll turn in and 
show Aunt Lizzie some of the fine points of cookery. I’ll 
boil the water just right if she makes the tea and I’ll put the 
potatoes in such elegant shape that all she’ll have to do is to 
cook them. I’m some kitchen maid myself, graduated in two 
weeks once while keeping bachelor’s hall in a shack on the 
beach.” 

“Correct, then,” said Mr. Morton; “I’ll call the folks and 
I’ll bet they’ll open their eyes wide when they hear me tell 
how you licked Nero single handed.” 

“Hello, Judge, is that you?” he called over the ’phone. 
“Yes, well you and Kate come right over and have supper 
with us, Jim is here and is helping me to do the chores. All 
right, come right along. There, it’s all settled. Now let’s 
get to the barn and have the work all done by the time they 
get here.” 

It was a real family party that sat down to supper after the 
Judge and Mrs. Albright had heard every word of the near 
tragedy of the evening and had condoled with Mary on her 
painful accident and congratulated her on the fact that she 
had a lucky escape for it might have been so much worse. 
Mrs. Morton had cooked a famous supper in the best style, for 
she was a model housekeeper and had everything of the very 
best to work with. The city hotel or restaurant or boarding 
house meal never looked or tasted like the one these six people 
out in the country sat down to. The talk was of the neigh¬ 
borhood affairs, particularly on one subject of more than pass¬ 
ing interest to them. Judge Morton had motored down to the 
city that afternoon and had heard of an invasion of the dis¬ 
trict by the I.W.W., a new and puzzling factor in the rural 
district affairs. He had heard they were making a special 
rendezvous of the county and were bringing in squads of al¬ 
leged workmen to stir things up during the autumn work in 
the country especially. The master of the grange had made a 
speech on the subject in the hall and advised every farmer to 
keep his eyes wide open while they were in the vicinity. 

It was the principal subject of discussion and held every- 


13 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

body’s attention. The meal was practically over and Jim 
and Mary were sitting silently side by side. They hadn’t said 
much and had let their elders do the talking. All were 
through eating except Mrs. Morton and Mrs. Albright. 
They had been waiting on the table and had struck an in¬ 
teresting plum preserve discussion near the close that delayed 
the end of the meal. 

Suddenly Jim spoke up and cut short their housekeeping 
dialogue: “I’ve got something to tell you folks that may per¬ 
haps interest you to some extent. Mary and I have made 
up our minds we’re going to get married. And we also 
agreed that we’re going to get married right away. Now 
everyone has got due and timely legal notice and I guess you 
all understand.” 

The party instantly became a speechless study. They 
might have been photographed then and there for a group 
representing wide-eyed surprise. The men sat back and just 
looked. Mrs. Morton had taken a bite off a crisp tea wafer 
and her hand remained suspended with the balance of the 
wafer while her jaws refused to chew. She forgot she was 
eating and looked helplessly at Big Jim and Mary. Mrs. 
Albright had a tiny cup of tea in her hand which she was sip¬ 
ping slowly with the tea epicure’s satisfaction. Mechanically 
she held the cup halfway to her lips and sat as if afraid to 
breathe. There was dead silence except for the tick, tock, 
tick, tock, of the brass-columned old clock on the mantel. 

“Well, have I knocked you all silly?” said Jim. “I didn’t 
know an unimportant bit of news like that would strike 
everybody dumb.” 

Mrs. Morton regained her powers of speech. “You folks 
mightn’t have been so secret with it and then all come with 
such a sudden shock. You took my breath away.” 

“And mine, too,” said Mrs. Albright. “You might have 
spread the news a little more gently, Jim. Now when are 
you going to be married?” 

“My vote is cast for to-morrow at two p.m.,” said Jim, “but 
as it’s probably the only wedding Mary will have of her own 


i 4 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

for a long time to come I’ll leave the choice of the time en¬ 
tirely to her, provided, however, that the ultimate limit is not 
over three weeks. My choice is for not over one day.” 

“Why, Jim,” said Mrs. Morton, “no woman can get 
ready to get married in a week or two weeks, either. So now 
just get this foolish haste idea out of your head. Make 
it a month or two or three or four and it would be more 
like it.” 

“Seems to me I heard of a woman who once got ready to 
get married on fifteen minutes’ notice and actually got mar¬ 
ried on a half hour’s notice,” said Jim, without looking up from 
his plate. A slight chuckle was heard from Mr. Morton’s 
direction and the others all smiled, including Mrs. Morton. 

“You needn’t remind me of my early day foolishness,” 
she said. “That was all John’s fault. We would have had 
a three months’ engagement if I had been consulted but he 
would have an elopement on the spur of the moment and I 
wasn’t going to let him escape while I had the chance. I 
might not have had another opportunity. But you’re not 
going to take Mary away, Jim?” she said anxiously. “We 
won’t allow that. You’ll live with us. You can have all the 
front of the house. John and I can live back here. There’s 
lots of room for us all.” 

“Or you can have the west half of our house,” said Mrs. 
Albright. “There’s an ocean of room for two families and 
we can’t let you go away off and live by yourselves among 
strangers.” 

“If you’re bound to get married,” said John Morton, “I’ll 
give you all the land cut off by the river below the meadow. 
There’s a house on it and a sort of a barn. I’m tired trying 
to take care of so much land and I’ll turn over the work and 
worry to you.” 

“I’ll throw in all the land on the other side of the river up 
to the road,” said the Judge. “There’s a good barn on it and 
the bridge there makes it handy to the house across the river. 
I guess we’ve got teams and machinery and stock enough for 
us all and we’ll sort of divide up.” 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 15 

“We had one old horse, blind of one eye, and a muley cow 
and a rented shack when we started out,” said Mrs. Albright, 
smiling at her husband. 

“And we had a team of ponies with no harness on them ex¬ 
cept a chattel mortgage and no home except the open prairie,” 
said Mrs. Morton. 

So the talk went on; everyone interested in the slightest de¬ 
tail of the coming wedding and sometimes all talking at once 
and forgetting the lapse of time till away into the night when 
it was arranged that Mary should announce the day and the 
hour of the ceremony to-morrow and that Jim and she should 
move into the house on the land donated by Mr. Morton and 
buy their own furniture except some heirlooms from the homes 
of the old folks and they should begin farming with the teams 
and machinery chosen by all from the two farms. 

Probably never on earth was there a group of people with 
each individual so wholesomely satisfied as this group was 
when they parted for the night. The expected had happened 
after all, the most interesting problem of all human exist¬ 
ence, the union of a young man and a young woman, in 
every way suited to each other, had been satisfactorily ar¬ 
ranged by themselves and their fathers and mothers. All 
were happy, tranquilly and radiantly happy. 

The next Sunday afternoon Big Jim and Mary were in their 
now favorite try sting place; seated on the small fir tree on 
the river bank and leaning back against the larger fir. Mary 
had set the day and the hour of their wedding at nine a.m. 
next Tuesday. Also she had designated a trip. They should 
take the eleven o’clock boat at the nearest stopping place for 
the cities to the south for a week or two or longer just as they 
found life enjoyable; they were not to hurry or worry and 
were to get back when they felt like coming home. Then they 
would come back and begin housekeeping in the house on the 
river bank. They were already at work on their farm. 

John Morton and his wife had deeded their part of the land 
to Mary and Judge and Mrs. Albright had deeded their part 
to Jim. The machinery and stock were already there. The 


16 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

new household was almost a fact in the neighborhood. 
Everybody near and far had heard the news and everybody 
acquiesced. The absolutely natural thing was happening. 
The gossips gossiped and all agreed in their gossiping. Big 
Jim and Mary! Why not! “God made them and he 
matched them,” said Mrs. Spinning to her husband; and that 
settled it in that household, as it had been unanimously set¬ 
tled in every household from beyond Sumas to away beyond 
the Skagit River and as far as Snohomish; for the old timers, 
the Chacos of the Pacific coast country, all knew the Mortons 
and the Albrights of Albright in the North River valley. 

Jim and Mary had talked over all the subjects near to 
them and then talked them over again, unconscious of the 
lapse of time or completion of the discussion. What mat¬ 
tered it if they talked over the same subject twice or three 
times or a dozen times? Everything old was new and 
everything new was old to them. They were living in the en¬ 
chanted land where the sun was always shining, the flowers 
always blooming, the fountains always spraying their waters 
into the mist that created the rainbows of promise, the birds 
always twittering love to one another in the gently swaying 
branches of the trees above and around them. Love of man 
for woman and love of woman for man, the most gifted en¬ 
chanter of all the ages, idealized life, and they lived through 
the ideal days forgetful of the currents and cross-currents of 
human perversity and unrighteousness and outright woe and 
ever-present tragedy and comedy of this grim old earth. 

“Do you know, Mary,” said Jim, “Eve been thinking the 
matter over and I don’t see why we can’t adopt the tithe plan 
in our church work. There’s only the two of us. We have 
clear sailing. We can work. We’re not afraid of hard work. 
We won’t starve anyway, and I don’t see why we can’t give 
one tenth of our income to the Lord’s work. I don’t want to 
say anything about it to any one, but I don’t see why we can’t 
just quietly keep books and hand over one tenth to Reverend 
Story at the end of each season. I believe it’s due from us. 
That’s the way they did in the old days when the Scriptures 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 17 

say they were a mighty sight closer to God than we are to¬ 
day, and I don’t see but that it’s our duty to do the very same 
thing. The old patriarchs had a near view of duty to God, I 
take it.” 

“Of course we can, Jim,” agreed Mary. “And we won’t 
let the folks nor any one know anything about it except it 
might be Mr. Story. We can do more than that. We can 
give something to the Salvation Army right along without 
noticing that we lose anything. They can use up a lot of 
odds and ends that we can spare just as well as not.” 

“That’s right,” said Jim. “They’re in touch with the 
ragged-coated humanity and can use almost anything in the 
shape of donations we give them and we’ll turn over things 
they can use regularly so they can depend on us for certain 
amounts.” 

“Yes, and the sisters, we mustn’t forget them,” said Mary. 
“They are giving their whole lives and all they have to the 
ones who need help the very worst in the world. We can 
afford to help them if they can afford to keep up that big 
hospital with so many of the patients charity ones.” 

“Correct,” said Jim. “You’re surely right, little girl. 
We mustn’t forget Sister Angeline. I was up there with her 
the other day. I saw one slip of a boy with both legs off, 
lying there on his clean bed in his clean clothes, seemingly as 
happy as a king; and he didn’t have a relative in the world to 
look after him except the sisters and the friends they pro¬ 
vided. And he didn’t pay them a cent from one year’s end 
to the other. I saw others just as bad and worse and they 
were getting just as good care and as much attention as the 
millionaires. And the sisters were moving round among 
them like silent-footed angels of good cheer, always working 
for the strangers who filled the rooms. I felt sort of ashamed 
of my little pittance of one dollar a month I have been giving 
Sister Angeline.” 

“We can make it two or three or four dollars a month in 
addition to what we give our own church,” said Mary. “ Let 
me see. Eggs are forty cents a dozen. Two extra eggs a 


i8 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT t 

day would be sixty eggs a month which would be five dozen, 
which would be two dollars a month. I can make our hens 
lay four extra eggs a day and that will be four dollars a month 
we can give Sister Angeline and we’ll never know we even had 
the money in our possession.” 

“That’s the way to figure it out,” said Jim. “I see you 
haven’t forgotten Professor Anderson’s gyrations in mathe¬ 
matics. You remember the poser: If a hen and a half lay an 
egg and a half in a day and a half how many eggs will eleven 
hens lay in eleven days? Now we’ve settled our religious 
finance business in our minds and all we have to do is to 
quietly and without ostentation make good. It’ 11 be a case 
of not letting our left hand know what our right hand doeth, 
all right, and now we’ll just make our way around Nero’s field 
this time instead of going across it. I know I can lick that 
bull but I’m not altogether sure he knows it, and until he 
comes up to me and acknowledges I can lick him I’m going 
to walk around him. That’s what I call diplomacy.” 

“I know it’s time to go,” said Mary, “for I hear old Bossy 
calling us for milking time.” They walked slowly around 
Nero’s pasture hand in hand and came to their own barn¬ 
yard. The sun was well down in the west and the farm 
animals, true to their unerring instinct, had gathered ex¬ 
pectantly in the yard. The horses and cows had come in or 
were slowly coming in from the pasture, browsing along the 
way, but always headed toward the barn. They were coming 
home, the only home they knew. 

Mary had got together several hundred white Leghorn 
chickens, pure white birds of the best laying strain. There 
were hens in the flock that had been trap nested by the chicken 
fanciers and had averaged over two hundred eggs per year. 
The whole flock was as near pure bred as they could be got. 
The pullets already gave promise of being as good producers 
as their mothers. The roosters stood straight up on their legs 
in the most aristocratic attitude and flapped their wings and 
crowed in a manner entirely different from the ordinary scrub 
roosters of the average farm flock. Scattered round the big 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 19 

yard in bunches, snowy white, alert, all alive with motion, 
bright of eye, red of overhanging, swinging comb, happy 
in the joy of healthy life, the chickens brightened and en¬ 
livened the rural panorama of the barnyard. They were at 
home with their friends, the horses and cows and sheep and 
hogs and with the collie dog and the two maltese kittens. 
There was no fear in them of any living thing with whom they 
came in contact. They flew to the backs of the other big 
animals and to the top of the board mangers and went down 
in the mangers and scratched around there. If Ben, the big 
percheron king of the horses, or Wooly, the diminutive hairy 
colt, nosed them around to get them off their hay or oats it 
was all right. The chickens just got out of the way for an 
instant, but if the thought came into their heads, which it 
usually did, they insinuated themselves back again and dis¬ 
puted without any ill feeling possession of the trough or rack, 
and the big animals seemed to say: “Well, it’s all right, we’re 
all friends and chums here, anyway.” And when one of the 
hens with the temperamental perversity that seems to run 
with the whole world of feathered femininity abandoned the 
array of nicely arranged nests and stole into a manger of hay 
and made her nest there, away down in one corner, and laid 
her eggs there daily, the big animals didn’t resent it and 
seemed to know and respect her wishes and kept their noses 
away from her little nook and did nothing worse than to 
scatter some loose hay or some oats or corn over her eggs, 
which didn’t interfere with her designs, for she always came 
back clucking and reclaimed her nest. 

As soon as Mary and Jim came through the gate there arose 
a hubbub all over the yard. From every direction white 
chickens came scurrying. The near ones came on the run as 
fast as their legs could carry them and the farther bunches 
aided their legs by extending their wings and paddling along, 
half flying, half running, seeming to fear they would be late 
in their greeting to their human friends. In a few seconds 
Mary was surrounded by a white sea in motion. Every 
chicken wanted to get right up close to her and her progress 


20 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

was barred by the bright-eyed, active moving throng that 
bunched on all sides of her. 

“Jim, just look at Fluffy," said Mary, and her face flushed 
with pleasure at the chickenly welcome as she picked up one 
of the smaller birds. “ See those tail feathers, how they grow. 
And here's old White Dove," she continued, picking up one 
of the older birds. In a minute she had her arms full, and 
white chickens were perched on her shoulders and arms. 
Some of them ran to Jim at first, but they soon deserted him 
and gathered with the rest around Mary while Jim stood on 
the outskirts of the moving circle and enjoyed the scene. 

“And here comes old Bossy to be milked," said Mary as a 
matronly red cow started toward her, making her way slowly 
and carefully through the fowls as though afraid of hurting 
some of them. jSlowly and with difficulty she placed her 
feet in their midst, shoving them to one side till she gained a 
footing and reached close enough to Mary so her nose could be 
extended to be scratched. There was a world of conscious con¬ 
tent in her deep, lustrous brown eyes and she was the fore¬ 
runner of a general movement among all the animals. Di¬ 
rections seemed to be passed around among them by the 
action of old Bossy to move up closer. Those that were feed¬ 
ing in the pasture near by and headed toward the yard stop¬ 
ped their feeding and started direct, one by one, for the yard. 
Those in the yard all moved toward Jim and Mary. The 
cows followed the lead of the chickens and crowded close 
around both Jim and Mary, although Mary was the favorite. 
One beautiful red calf came rather impetuously through the 
chickens and got its head under Mary's arm. On the outer 
edge of the ring of cows were the steers, big and little, with 
the sheep mixed in; then there were the horses with the hogs 
among them, sometimes between their legs, the heads of all 
the animals turned toward their two friendly benefactors. 

“I like to look at their honest eyes," said Jim, as he stroked 
the glossy neck of his leading work horse, Prince, with one 
hand and scratched the nose of a favorite four-year-old-steer, 
Red Dan, with the other hand. “There’s no deception in 


21 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

them; they mean just what they say; they’re with us for good 
and all and we’re glad they’re our fast friends. I wish all our 
neighbors had as honest and trustworthy eyes as our barn¬ 
yard proteges have. See the splendid deep glow in old 
Prince’s eyes. No painter ever caught that inner expression; 
it’s a mingling of the depth of the eagle’s vision with the per¬ 
fection of unsullied benevolence. His honest eye and his 
honest face is a perfect picture. And here’s Little Spirit. 
Just look at her lustrous dark eyes. You can see a mile deep 
in them and they’re as soft and entrancing as fairy moonlight. 
I wonder what an animal thinks and in what sort of a mental 
world they live. If outward expression is the sign of inner 
mental processes then these cows and horses and chickens 
and sheep have a domain of thought to themselves that we 
cannot share. No human eye is as deep in its wondrous 
depths as old Molly’s. Now old horses and cattle and hogs 
,and sheep and chickens,” he said, raising his voice, “it’s milk¬ 
ing time and feeding time and egg gathering time and we’ll 
all go to work, heigh ho! everybody to their business!” The 
barnyard seemed to understand. The big group slowly broke 
away and slowly scattered back around the yard. Jim called 
to his hired man and the milking commenced. Mary started 
to make the rounds of the chicken houses with a basket in 
each hand to gather the half day’s eggs. 

Jim was a fast milker. As the streams of milk fell on the 
white froth near the top of his first pailful he said: “Will, I’m 
going to buy more cows and put in milking machines. This 
drudgery can be done by machinery and we’ll turn that 
timothy and barley into butter instead of selling it in bulk.” 


CHAPTER II 


T HE next evening as they sat at their usual trysting 
place Jim said: “There’s one man we can always go 
to with our troubles. I was just thinking over it this 
morning and I’m sort of ashamed the way I’ve sidestepped 
Reverend Story. He’s been with us here all these years and 
I’ve stood off myself and stood him off when I know he wanted 
to do just the right thing and be my best friend. And that 
was all he wanted. He wasn’t asking nor thinking of any 
personal advantage for himself. He just wanted to help me 
get closer to God and be a better man and better citizen and 
better Christian and I stood him off. I feel like going to him 
with our affairs. Our personal and family secrets are as safe 
with him as they are with ourselves. He would be burned 
at the stake before he’d give out to the world any confidence 
we give him, and his counsel is not only free and of the best 
motive but it’s impersonal in the sense that it’s the counsel of 
an outsider who is on the inside. Sometime when we get 
round to it I’m in favor of going to him and telling him just 
where we stand and then going right along with him as he 
says we should. We can’t go wrong in so doing and it’s a 
cinch that we can more nearly keep on the right track.” 

“Why not go right now?” said Mary. “He’s at home, I 
know, because I saw him there as we came from the city. 
We can go right now, this minute. He’s not so busy at this 
time of the week preparing his sermon and doing other church 
work as he will be later. We can walk over there now and be 
there just after they’ve had supper. Let’s go now and have 
a talk with him and have the preliminary embarrassment over 
with.” 

“You’re right, little girl, as usual. You’re a jewel. I guess 


22 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 23 

your intuition beats mine on things of this kind. We’ll go 
quick and straight before we think up some excuse for put¬ 
ting it off” 

In a few minutes they came to Reverend Story’s cottage 
near the church. It was of the bungalow type and looked 
neat and new although it was an old building. Reverend 
Story was something of a mechanic and in his odd hours de¬ 
lighted in getting out and puttering round with paint brush 
and hammer and hand saw. This was not only a pleasant 
diversion for him but a useful occupation out in the country. 
While it made holiday recreation for the pastor it kept his 
house and grounds and even the church in order and neatness 
and newness of appearance and saved the country parish¬ 
ioners a great deal of time and trouble. The gate Jim opened 
was part of a dustless white picket fence and the pathway 
they walked to the door was white sand bordered with gleam¬ 
ing white shells that the minister had picked up himself on 
the Pacific Ocean shore on one of his summer trips to Nacot- 
tah beach. 

Mrs. Story answered the doorbell. She was the elderly 
minister’s type of wife. She was neatly dressed but not over¬ 
dressed anywhere. Her hair was abundant and that silver 
gray that was as beautiful as the brown tint of youth had been 
many years before. She had the face of the woman who had 
inherited goodness and kindness and then had that goodness 
and kindness intensified and made part of her being by her 
long environment as the wife of the young, middle-aged, and 
now elderly minister. Her family of four had grown up and 
flown to other fields. Her life had been that of the practical 
mother whose domestic affairs had always run very close to 
the borderline of economy but had never known actual want. 
If the income hadn’t been big enough for the outgo she had 
curtailed the outgo. She had been the sheet anchor of her 
husband’s existence. She had warded off his domestic 
troubles before he knew they had crossed his path. She 
had acted as go-between and tempered his pastoral relations 
with his people in his various pastorates. Mrs. Story was so 


24 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

nice and so sensible and so sympathetic that her husband was 
nearly always spared the ordeal of meeting the needless tale 
of trouble and the neurasthenic neighborhood gossip both in¬ 
side and outside his congregation, 

“We came in to take up five minutes of the time of Rev¬ 
erend Story,” said Jim after the first greetings at the door. 
Mrs. Story ushered them into the parlor, which was also the 
minister’s study, and then discreetly left for the kitchen pre¬ 
cincts of the house which were far removed from hearing and 
seeing what went on in the front rooms. Mrs. Story had al¬ 
ways made it a part of her rule of procedure to allow her 
husband to be the only confidant of his visitors unless they 
themselves forced their confidences on her. 

Rev. Wilfred Story had the strong, earnest, kindly face of 
the minister old in age and experience. There was a striking 
resemblance in the facial appearance of himself and his wife, 
one strictly masculine as it was and the other strictly feminine. 
The sometimes noticeable fact that two people, a man and a 
woman who get married in early life and have tastes and tem¬ 
peraments so similar that they unify their daily life, grow to 
similarity in facial expression and feature characteristics, 
was exemplified in Mr. and Mrs. Story. Mr. Story had en¬ 
joyed his first pastorate as a boy of twenty-one and he now 
enjoyed his present pastorate as a man of sixty-two and she 
had been with him almost every day of those years. His life 
had been eventful and uneventful. He never had much 
money at any one time and he never wanted much for him¬ 
self. He had wanted much more money many times to 
scatter in his works; to do the things he wanted done for his 
own people and other people and he had often taken part of his 
own little salary to help pay for silent working beneficences 
of which the great world never heard and never will know. 
When he was beginning his first pastorate his superior 
official, then an elderly, white-haired Christian worker, had 
called him into his study and talked long and earnestly to 
him about his future career. The veteran in the cause of 
Christ had impressed one thing indelibly on the mind of the 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 25 

youthful crusader: That his success in all his future life 
would be measured by one test and one only: his success in 
saving souls. Every talent he had and every opportunity 
that came his way and every influence he could command 
must centre on this one object. His failure would be mea¬ 
sured by his divergences from the primal and ultimate pur¬ 
pose; his success would be measured by his oneness of aim, his 
concentration of forces on the turning to Christ of a complex- 
natured humanity. It was a wonderful conference to the 
young preacher and it shaped his entire life. He was moulded 
into an unswerving devotee of the ministry of the Cross by 
the memories of that one hour. 

He stopped his work, shoved across the desk the writing 
materials he was using, and rose to meet his visitors. 

“Well, Jim, Fm glad to have you and Mary come in,” he 
said as he rose and shook hands. “My brain was getting 
cloudy. It isn’t natural for a man to be alone in this world. 
We need companionship and mixing and exchange of ideas and 
cooperation among ourselves to produce the best results that 
we are capable of. Sit down. Fm glad you’ve dropped in.” 

“And we’re glad we came in, too,” said Jim as they sat 
down. “I’m going to tell you our errand right away so’s we 
can all understand the exact situation before I try to side 
step it. In the first place, Mary and I are going to get mar¬ 
ried next Tuesday at ten a.m. and we want you to officiate.” 

“That’s very nice news,” said the minister. “I heard a 
rumor to that effect the other day and I’ll be on hand. I’ll 
be on time, too.” 

“All right, then, that is settled. But our main errand isn’t 
that, Mr. Story. It’s something else altogether and a far 
more difficult problem.” The smiles had died out as Jim 
went on and the minister waited for his revelation. “You 
see, Mr. Story, to make a long story short, Mary and I are 
going to be married and become an independent household 
and we want to start right. We’ve figured out that it’s 
easier to start right than to face about or halfway about after 
we’ve got on the road.” 


26 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

“I see exactly,” said Mr. Story, nodding vigorously. 

“Now Mary and I are non-religious. We’re not irreligious. 
We’re just non-religious. We don’t try to be criminal or 
wicked or oppose Christian belief or do anything particularly 
positive in opposition, but we don’t do anything very positive 
or active on the Lord’s side, either. We’re as neutral as the 
average non-christian who believes in the fundamentals and 
just lags along. It’s easier doing the routine work of just 
lagging along than anything else I know of. When I went 
to high school Professor Foster used to tell us over and over 
again of inertia in the material world; of how a material body 
would hold its established position for ever and ever because 
of inertia, provided some force didn’t hit it and move it, and 
how the same material body, if it was once hit and started, 
would keep up its motion for ever and ever because of the 
same inertia, provided some other force didn’t come in its way 
and stop it. Now Mary and myself are in the first class 
along with the great multitudes of our neighbors and friends. 
Our human inertia is keeping us fixed just where we are. 
We’re passively non-religious and we want to become actively 
religious. We want to become spiritually religious for our own 
sakes. We want to get nearer to God ourselves. We want to 
become real spiritual Christians so that our inner lives will be 
shaped by the teachings of the Holy Spirit. Then we want 
to become openly religious so that the world may all know that 
we are on the Lord’s side. And we want to become mili- 
tantly religious in church work, for the extension of the 
Master’s dominion, and socially religious in our dealings with 
our fellow mortals, and we have come to you for advice.” 

The minister’s face was a changing human panorama as 
Jim went on. Emotion after emotion seemed to sweep 
across his soul as he caught the meaning of the simple, un- 
rhetorical statement of the young man. At its close he arose 
and extended his arms above his head in an attitude of sup¬ 
plication and as the tears rolled down his cheeks and his frame 
shook he sobbed: “I thank Thee, O my God! that I have 
lived to see this day. Let the influences of the Holy Spirit 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 27 

fill the soul of Thy servant and light his way and uphold his 
arm. Let the spiritual faith and the spiritual force of the 
prophets of God be his. Thou hast said: ‘Seek and ye shall 
find!’ O! God of our dazed and struggling human race, come 
to our aid and direct us to-night with Thy own omniscience 
in wisdom, Thy own omnipotence in power.” 

For an instant he stood in his posture of supplication while 
Jim and Mary sat before him with bowed heads. Then 
lowering his arms he knelt at his chair, while Jim and Mary 
did the same, and raising his clasped hands above his head 
poured forth his soul’s supplication in earnest prayer, one of 
those prayers that seemed not to be man made. At its con¬ 
clusion Jim and Mary, and Mrs. Story, who had been passing 
the door and heard part and had silently crept in to kneel with 
the others, echoed “amen.” 

“You don’t know or realize what this means to me,” he 
said after they had arisen, as tears of joy still streamed down 
his cheeks and his voice still shook. “For years I have prayed 
morning, noon, and night that our young people of this 
neighborhood might be brought to the foot of the Cross. I 
have watched and prayed and hoped. The ways of God are 
not ours. I had faith and believed in the power of prayer 
even when the years rolled round and the negligence of our 
people seemed established and immovable. I have got out of 
bed at midnight and prayed, and every prayer strengthened 
my trust that God in His own time and in His own way would 
lead all you young people to seek Him, and now, when the 
days have lengthened into months and the months into 
years, I am granted the privilege of living to see my prayers 
for you fully answered. Bless you, my children, bless you!” 
and he took a hand of each while Mrs. Story put her arm 
around Mary and rested the other hand on her husband’s and 
Jim’s. “Our God never turns a deaf ear to him or her who 
asks for the light of His grace. He is our Father in heaven 
and His love and mercy endureth forever. 

“And now we will talk over the thoughts that are nearest 
to us and have an experience meeting all to ourselves. An 


28 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

open confession is always good for the soul. I have found al¬ 
ways that where two or three even are gathered together ‘in 
His name’ that the expressions of one always echo in the soul 
of another. Religious thoughts are contagious. Religious 
truths are fundamental in us. They are part of our being. 
If we don’t express them, we are guilty of a dangerous natural 
repression. Our instinct is really powerful toward the ex¬ 
pression of religious thought. It is an abnormal world-made 
condition that suppresses interchange of religious ideas and 
religious emotions. In a natural condition men and women 
think and talk of God and God’s ways and His divine provi¬ 
dence as an hourly subject of conversation. Now let us act 
naturally, throw off the embarrassment that the world has 
thrown as a thick cloud mantle around the subject of our soul 
in its relation to God, and confide in one another. Do we all 
feel that we are saved through Christ and that this is the most 
pertinent of questions for every man and woman and child on 
earth to-day?” 

“I cannot feel sure that I am,” said Mary. “I went to 
Sunday-school as a little child and then have been going to 
church every Sunday since I grew up, but I miss something 
when I come to answer the question: Am I saved? The real 
saved Christian seems to have something I have not. I’ve 
seen them in church and out and heard their confessions and 
they have achieved something that I lack. I don’t see the 
shining light of grace that they do. I think I’m near its 
presence, but I miss the light. I wish I could see it.” 

“I’m not an irreligious man,” said Jim, “but I’m not a con¬ 
verted man either. I’m a little like Mary in that respect. 
There’s something lacking in my personal experience. I 
want to be a real Christian. I want to achieve the same re¬ 
lationship to God as I know thousands of others have verily 
done. I want to know positively that I, Jim Albright, am 
right with God. I suppose I’m honest and moral, but honesty 
and morality do not give me the satisfaction of soul that the 
converted and saved Christian seems to have.” 

“That is right,” said the minister, “and you have arrived 


29 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

at the beginning of the road, a realization of what is lacking, 
what is perhaps necessary. God’s boundless grace is free, 
but it is free only to the zealous seeker. To share in it we 
must be willing to do something, and not only must we be 
willing but we must do it. And what we are asked to do is 
not difficult. It is the most delightfully easy task that was 
ever given to humanity. We must attune our minds as 
though they were multistringed instruments to the chords of 
God’s great orchestra. We must try to be one with God; we 
must pray and pray without ceasing for His grace to dwell in 
our souls, and the more we try to be one with God the easier 
and pleasanter and more satisfactory every day life will be, 
and the more we pray for the converting grace of God the 
easier and pleasanter those minutes of prayer will become. 
Some day, be it near or far, we will surely realize that we are 
one with God, that we are saved, that we are really Christian. 
It is the most wonderful of experiences and all of us can 
attain the desired end. Pardon for sins is the free gift of God 
to all transgressors. It was given to the erring sinner on the 
Cross and it will surely be given to you and to me if we go to 
the foot of the Throne of Grace and ask for it. Now we will 
pray to our Father again and ask His help, for He alone can 
help us, He alone can save us.” 

“There’s another thing,” said Jim, when they had arisen 
from their knees, “that Mary and I have talked over and 
sort of figured out in our own way. We want to be Christians 
and we want to be working Christians and we want to be 
honest Christians. We want to be honest with ourselves and 
honest with our fellowman and our church and honest with 
God. We want to give him everything that is His in a ma¬ 
terial way. If we owe Him ten dollars and give Him two 
that’s not honest on our part. Now we understand that in 
the olden days the rule was for every man to give one tenth 
of all his income to the Lord. He could give as much more as 
he pleased but one tenth was the command and agreement. 
If that was the regulation, then who changed it so as to justify 
a Christian in giving one fiftieth or one one hundredth or 


3 o BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

one one thousandth or perhaps next to nothing at all to the 
Lord ?” 

“Your question goes to the very root of Christian duty. 
That is one of the Christian duties that has been changed in 
the run of the centuries without any reason. Probably it first 
began to be neglected in the early days when the Christians 
were hunted and persecuted and had no surety of either in¬ 
come or life. At any rate, the rule that a certain part of 
each income was justly due the Lord from every individual 
was forgotten and neglected more and more as the hundreds 
of years went slowly by and generation succeeded generation 
until now it is hardly recognized that such a binding regula¬ 
tion ever existed. The sorrows and inadequacies of the 
spiritual church of to-day are largely owing to the really ir¬ 
religious forgetfulness on the part of the church membership 
of this ancient regulation that has never been repealed or 
changed in the slightest. We see the vast, uncultivated 
heathen and semi-heathen fields before us; they are not only 
uncultivated but the most noxious weeds are growing proli- 
fically all over them, scattering their seeds everywhere, even 
on our Christian cultivated ground, and we have not the ma¬ 
terial tools wherewith to plow these weeds under because 
Christians have forgotten the tithe law made by the Lord 
himself in the days when he actually appeared on earth and 
talked personally with His prophets and corps of inspired 
teachers. In those days the tithe part of a man’s income 
was very easily set apart, for the peoples to whom the regulation 
was given were agricultural as we are here mostly.” 

“It seems simple as far as we are concerned,” said Mary. 
“I am sure we can add up our total income once or twice a 
year and take away one tenth of it. But we wouldn’t know 
what to do with it. We’ll have to turn it over to you to allot 
out wherever the money can be best spent in Christian work.” 

“We can do that,” said Jim. “We can keep books and 
give a check for the one tenth. We don’t want to make it 
public now. We don’t want even to let our own folks know 
what we are doing; at least until we get started for two or 


3i 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

three years. We’ll begin just as soon as we’re married next 
Tuesday. The ceremony will be over at ten twenty-five a.m. 
We’ll begin our tithe bookkeeping at ten twenty-six a.m. 
We will call on you again, Mr. Story, when we have troubles 
that no one else cares to listen to.” 

“God bless you, my children,” said the minister fervently 
as he shook hands with each at parting. “You have made 
this one of the real happy days of my life. If the Christian 
congregations of America were to do as you plan doing in 
carrying out the tithe regulation, the Christian church could 
storm all the citadels of ignorance, heathenism, and sin and 
win the world for Christ without a doubt. It could sweep sin 
from the face of the earth, I believe, if it had the resources 
to work with. But we will pray and trust the Lord in all 
things. Perhaps we do not understand. Now come again. 
Consider this your home. Mrs. Story joins with me, I 
know, in my well wishes.” 

As Mary took Jim’s arm at the door and as they turned into 
the road she said: “Jim, I’m so glad we came here to-night. 
It’s the beginning of a new life. I’m going to get down on 
my knees to-night and pray for help.” 

“I’ll be doing the same, little girl,” he answered as he 
gathered both her hands into his one big palm. “We’re on 
the right road, and we’ll ask the Lord to keep us there and 
keep us going straight ahead.” 

They had just rounded the corner in the road after leaving 
the minister’s house when their attention was suddenly 
drawn to a scene ahead of them that scattered the thoughts 
they were thinking and about which neither had time to 
frame words. Art Grantham, a farmer living four miles 
north of them, was there with his team and wagon. One 
horse was down flat on his side with his head stretched out in 
the dirt while his feet were tangled up more or less in the 
harness. The other horse stood quietly on the other side of 
the wagon tongue and held it up and preserved the balance of 
things generally. Art was a red-faced, choleric, impatient, 
profane fellow. He was pounding the horse that was down 


32 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

with a club and the sound of the blows could be heard far up 
and down the road. The horse made no move in answer to 
the blows except to twitch his body where the blows raised 
great welts, and now and then between the blows he groaned. 
Art would swear furiously for a half minute and pound furi¬ 
ously for the next minute and a half or until he got out of 
breath. An onlooker could hardly believe that such blows 
were intended for any living animal. Mary averted her 
eyes and shuddered as the club rose and fell and Jim quick¬ 
ened his step as they came nearer and saw what was really 
taking place. Art didn’t notice them till they were close to 
him. He half stopped his exercise and as they came even 
with him stopped altogether and leaned on his club. 

“The bloody brute balked right here on the level road with 
nothing but the empty wagon behind him to pull,” he said as 
he wiped the sweat from his brow. “Then to finish up he 
threw himself and came mighty close to breaking the wagon 
tongue. Guess he intends to get his legs over it when he 
gets up and break it yet. Hear him groan, will you. A fel¬ 
low would think he was dying. If that horse ever does die 
it’ll be from downright deviltry.” 

Jim knew the horse: an almost thoroughbred that was per¬ 
fect in wind and limb and action and had the reputation of 
being hard to handle. His lot had been a tough one with 
different owners, and from his present actions he seemed to 
be a highstrung, capable animal, thoroughly spoiled by just 
such treatment as Grantham was meting out with his club 
and profanity. 

“Let us try to get him up,” said Jim, as he went to the 
horse’s head and raised it. Grantham was willing for any 
one to take charge after his twenty minutes of futile labor. 
“Now,” said Jim, “you poke the harness off his legs with the 
club before he starts any movement. All right now, here 
goes ” and he got against the horse’s neck and exerting his 
great strength fairly shoved him upward. The horse sprang 
to his feet with a bound when he did start and stood there 
like a statue, with front feet outspread, head straight out in 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 33 

front, and a wicked look in his eye that showed fight to the 
finish. He was a splendid looking animal although he showed 
all the signs of hard usage. 

“Does he do this trick often?” asked Jim. 

“Just whenever the dratted brute nature in him takes a 
notion. There’s no telling when he’s going to take a tantrum 
and hold me up for half a day. A balky horse is the limit. 
I’m going to have it out with him now, though. He either 
has to help pull this empty wagon home or I’ll beat him to 
death. I may just as well have no horse as one that won’t 
even walk along a level road. Now stand back and I’ll try 
him again.” 

He took the lines with a firm grip and stood behind the 
horse and chirped to the team. The other horse started at 
once, but the balky one lowered his head a trifle and spread 
his front feet a little farther apart and showed a little more of 
the white rings around his blazing eyes, standing like a horse 
of stone. He was a perfect picture of active, powerful 
obstinacy. He wasn’t going to go and these tormentors 
were not capable of making him go. They might kill him, 
but go he wouldn’t. Grantham grasped the lines tight 
with one hand as if expecting the horse to run away if he 
took the notion at any moment, and brandished the club with 
the other hand. He struck the animal as hard as he could 
twice. The blows were of the killing kind. As the club was 
raised the third time the horse sprang high in the air and 
came down with one foreleg across the tongue, which was 
strong enough to hold him up. There, half standing, half 
lying down, he rested, awaiting further developments, and 
the next thing that was to happen. His position was stra¬ 
tegic and he knew it. He had done that very thing before and 
had learned how. 

“Hold!” said Jim. “He’ll break the wagon tongue, sure. 
We must get him oflF. Unhook the traces. I’ll loosen the 
neck yoke.” Carefully the two men worked around the horse 
that seemed to be aware of his advantageous position till the 
wagon tongue fell to the ground between his feet and he 


34 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

stood straightened up again with feet outspread and head 
lowered ready to do it all over the second time if necessary. 

“How much will you give for him?” asked Grantham as he 
stood back and wiped his red face. 

“I think he’s worth ten dollars. We could put him in some 
show as a perfect bad actor,” said Jim. 

“He’s yours. You get the horse only. I take the harness. 
Here’s my club; it goes with the horse,” said Grantham. 
Stripping the harness off the balky one he threw it in the 
wagon and whirled the cause of the trouble around to Jim 
with only the halter on. “Give me the ten. You’ve 
bought the devilishest temper that was ever enclosed in a 
superfine body. He’s worth two hundred and fifty dollars 
of any man’s money if you can separate the temper from the 
horse.” Without a word Jim handed over a ten-dolllar bill 
and led the horse over to the fence and tied him. Then he 
patted his neck and worked back to his heels. “He doesn’t 
kick,” said Grantham who was watching the performance. 
“Never saw him lift a hind leg; doesn’t know how, I guess. 
But he knows every other ornery trick on earth. Now help 
me tie up this wagon tongue and old Bob will haul me home 
alone.” In a few minutes he started toward home with one 
horse hauling the wagon. Jim went back and petted the 
balky horse some more. He had changed his fighting eye 
for an everyday, peaceful look and showed signs of being 
normal again. 

“I’m sure he’s a beautiful horse,” said Mary. “See what 
a perfect form he has. Too bad he’s balky.” 

“Yes,” said Jim, “and it’s too bad a lot of these humans 
are allowed to have horses under their control. Here’s a 
real horse spoiled by ignorance. I doubt if he can be re¬ 
claimed now, but we’ll try. At any rate, no one will ever 
strike him again. Perhaps we can coax him into form. 
Let’s see his teeth. A horse’s teeth are like the teeth of men 
and women. They’re the cause of a world of woe among 
equines, and a horse with the toothache is just as vicious 
and ill feeling as a man with the toothache, and the average 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 35 

man with the toothache is like a snarling dog if you cross him 
or even if you look at him. See there; see that sharp point 
of a tooth coming down there and partly striking the gum 
below? And see the unevenness of those teeth? I’ll bet he 
slobbers his grain all over the manger because it hurts him to 
chew. To-morrow morning I’ll have Doc Hayes level off 
those teeth. To-night I’ll feed him a bran mash that he 
doesn’t need much teeth to chew. .1 know that’s one cause 
of this horse’s vicious temper, and we may find other 
natural removable causes. If we can handle him we’ve 
got a prize. What shall we call him? The name is up to 
you.” 

“Dexter,” said Mary. “I once saw the picture of the so- 
called perfect horse. His name was Dexter.” 

“All right, you lead Dexter home, then. He may be 
tractable with you. At any rate, he can see that you have no 
club.” 

The horse seemed to conclude he had fallen into the hands 
of friends and walked along behind Mary like a pet dog. 
By the time they got home Dexter was himself and not a 
fighting fiend and seemed to appreciate the lot of petting 
bestowed on him. 

“Tie him out here in the yard,” said Jim, “and I’ll test my 
tooth theory. We’ll try him on some oats first.” He 
brought some oats in a bucket and set it down before Dexter. 
The horse plunged his head into the bucket and grabbed a 
big mouthful of the oats in a ravenous manner, as if he were 
very hungry, and commenced to chew them. As he did so 
be swung his head from side to side and as Jim had said 
slobbered his oats all around on the ground, getting only a 
fraction of them. Out of the big mouthful he chewed only a 
pittance of the grain. He dived after another mouthful in 
the same ravenous manner and repeated the slobbering. 

“You see,” said Jim, “the oats are sharp and his gums are 
tender from contact with those ragged teeth. Probably one 
or more of his teeth are sore. That is the roots of the tooth 
are set in a socket that has become inflamed, and biting on any 


36 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

kind of a hard substance hurts him just as the same trouble 
would hurt us and does hurt multitudes of people. The 
dentists call it infected apices and other big names, but it’s a 
horse trouble as much as a man and woman trouble, and 
after all it’s a sore tooth and nothing else. We can humor 
such a tooth and keep it from hurting too much by soaking 
our bread crusts and eating boiled mush and soup, but the 
poor horse has to eat hard, sharp-pointed oats and corn as 
hard as little rocks with his sore tooth and he can’t speak out 
and complain. It may be that Dexter has a hollow tooth 
and these oats are a pretty irritating thing to an exposed tooth 
nerve. I’m going to take these away and make him a nice 
warm bran mash sprinkled light with salt.” 

Dexter sort of disputed Jim’s taking the oats away by 
keeping his nose in the bucket. He seemed actually to be 
starving although wasting four fifths of the grain by slobber¬ 
ing it around and he looked longingly after his feed as Jim 
carried it away. In five minutes, however, Jim reappeared 
with another bucket and was greeted with an eager, hungry 
whinny as he came near. He set it down and again the 
horse ravenously grabbed a big mouthful. He handled 
the bran mash much more efficiently than the oats and 
slobbered much less of it, and toward the last quit his raven¬ 
ous methods of grabbing an overplus mouthful although he 
still scattered a little. 

“I believe there’s one third of the fuzzy horse coats and 
other horse troubles due to decayed teeth or uneven teeth in 
horses,” said Jim. “A good horse dentist is an invaluable 
man in the vicinity and I’m going to ’phone Hayes right now 
and have him here first thing in the morning. I’ll bet if we 
get Dexter’s teeth fixed up he’ll be worth more than ten 
dollars. Now I’ll turn him in the clover and we’ll see if he’s 
hard to catch in the morning.” 

“I’m glad we saved him from that awful beating,” said 
Mary. “It was worth the ten dollars just to get him away 
from that man with the club. An angry man and a big 
club and a helpless horse are a sickening combination. I’m 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 37 

glad my people don’t use clubs. If you stoop down, Jim, 
I’ll kiss you just for buying Dexter.” 

“Well, that’s worth the ten dollars,” said Jim. “Pm going 
to buy up all the abused horses in the country if I get a reward 
like that every time. You’ll see me coming up here every 
evening with a string of blind, spavined, windgalled, sway 
back, and balky horses. Now I’ll put Dexter where he can 
fill up full to-night.” 

A few days later Mary heard Jim calling: “Come on out to 
the barnyard and see the fun. I’m going to hitch Dexter up 
to the light wagon and try him out. He may or he may not, 
I think most probably he may not.” She went out to the 
yard and heard Jim softly whistling to Dexter who was out 
in the pasture. The horse lifted his head, saw who it was, 
and came to lick some salt out of his hand. Jim opened the 
gate and let him in. “Looks fine, doesn’t he?” 

“He sure does,” said Mary. “See how his coat shines, and 
it’s been only a few days since we got him. He’s fattening 
up, looks like a different horse altogether.” 

“Yes,” said Jim, “leveling of those teeth did it. His gums 
healed up in three days and he’s eating corn and oats now all 
right. I still feed him a little mash, but he can get away with 
the hard grain. Now for the crisis. Will he or will he not ? 
I’ll bet even either way.” 

He threw his strongest harness on Dexter and hitched him 
to the light wagon. He made sure that his lines and the 
connecting snaps and all the buckles on the harness were 
secure and strong and not cracked or broken in any way, for 
this horse might play any kind of a trick. Then he led Dex¬ 
ter to the gate and back again. Then he hitched him to the 
wagon. He led him with the wagon to the gate again and 
opened it and turned round in the road and led him back 
again. He turned round again and climbed into the wagon 
and told the horse to go. Dexter made a few restive motions 
with his ears and looked inquiringly behind him, but when 
Jim chirped to him the second time he started off with a toss 
of his head, walked quietly to the gate, turned into the road 


3 8 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

toward town, and struck out in a sweeping trot. In an 
hour Jim was back, his horse steaming, and he was jubilant. 
“Worked as quiet as a lamb,” he said. “And such action! 
He’s a thoroughbred, all right.” 

“But what’s that copper wire from his bridle bit to his tail 
for?” asked Mary. 

“Oh, that’s a forgetter wire. You see, a horse is the 
stupidest animal in the world. They have a popular repu¬ 
tation of being the most intelligent. It’s only in dime novels 
literature that a horse is intelligent. Every horse is stupid 
beyond description in real life. They have room for only 
one idea in their head at a time. Their brains are not 
geared to hold two ideas at the same time. That’s the reason 
a team of horses will run away and kill themselves and every¬ 
thing else they come across. They’ll run square up against a 
stone wall and knock their brains out or go over a precipice. 
They have the idea of running in their heads and while that 
idea is there the other idea of stopping or avoiding danger 
can’t get into their brains. There isn’t room for the two 
ideas in that brain at the same time. A mule won’t run it¬ 
self to death nor will it run into danger. It will stop because 
it thinks. There’s room in their brains for two ideas at the 
same time. Hogs and dogs are ten times more intelligent 
than horses, and an elephant is a thousand times more in¬ 
telligent. Now, you see, Dexter balks. That is, he gets the 
idea in his head that he’s not going to travel ahead. He has 
that idea, and no other idea can get a chance at him. If I 
can get the idea of standing still out of his head there’s a 
chance of the other idea, that of moving on, popping into the 
place vacated by the standing still idea. So I rigged up a 
light battery in the garage and have it here in the wagon. 
When I want to start Dexter and he seems to want to ask 
questions about this starting business I’ll make him forget 
his standing still idea by sending a light electric shock 
through him from his head to his tail. The surprise of this 
will drive the one idea in his head out and before it can come 
back I’ll replace it with the other idea of moving on by urging, 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 39 

and he moves and keeps going, for he’s now got the idea of 
moving. It’s a great scheme, while it works of course. At 
any rate, that is a good theory and it has worked so far, and a 
balky horse is about the perfectest thing in the world to ex¬ 
ploit good theories or fool theories on; also the perfectest thing 
in the world I guess to explode all sorts of theories on.” 

“And did you try it yet, Jim?” 

“Sure. I surprised Dexter out of his life up the road. 
I didn’t put it on till I got away from the garage, so there’s 
no one can laugh at me, but I’m certain I can make Dexter 
start a load and keep pulling it with my forgetter wire. We’ll 
try him with a load after one more trip without anything 
heavy behind him.” 

The next day Jim and Mary were on the road to town with 
a heavy load. Dexter was one of the team. He was acting 
as true as old Prince beside him. Although there were some 
heavy short grades that made hard pulling for the team 
Dexter never flinched. “Jim,” said Mary, “I think we owe 
Art Grantham some more money on Dexter. He’s as good a 
horse as we’ve got now and I’m sure he’s going to stay that 
way. Don’t you think it would be right to pay him some 
more ?” 

“Yes, indeed, little girl. I’ll see him one of these days 
and give him a surprise. Dexter is worth more money to 
us.” They drove up one of the side streets to unload. 
There was a steep incline just before they reached the ware¬ 
house. It was a heavy pull for two horses and Prince and 
Dexter had to show their mettle. Once they almost had to 
stop at the steepest place and Dexter adopted heroic tactics. 
He crouched like a cat and dug in his feet with fore legs 
bent and hung on, advancing the load foot by foot till the 
worst was over and the load stood by the platform. “Good 
boy, Dexter,” said Jim as he jumped from the wagon and 
patted the panting horse. “You surely saved the day that 
time.” 

“How on earth did you hypnotize him?” It was Art 
Grantham who spoke at Jim’s elbow. He and half a dozen 


4 o BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

others of the neighbors had been standing on the steps of the 
hotel near by and had seen the amazing performance. 

“Oh, he just took a notion to pull good and strong. Come 
into the warehouse, Art. Here’s a check for one hundred and 
forty dollars, that makes one hundred and fifty for the horse. 
He’s worth more only there are some drawbacks. I can’t 
trust him with the hired help. They would put him back 
where he was when I got him and I can’t sell him for the 
same reason. Whoever bought him would probably turn 
him into a balky horse in a week and then I’d have the rep¬ 
utation of swindling the buyer and I can’t afford to have 
that said of me. None of us can afford even to seem to do a 
dishonest thing.” 

Grantham took the check slowly with a shaking hand. His 
face turned paler and tears rolled down his cheeks. Jim 
looked at him in astonishment and seeing he was under the 
influence of some strong emotion turned casually away to do 
some figuring at the desk so as not to increase his embarrass¬ 
ment. After a couple of minutes Grantham’s control of 
himself partially returned. “Jim,” he said in a voice that 
quavered, “you’ve saved me this morning. You don’t owe 
me a cent legally. I sold you the horse for ten dollars even 
money. That was his price and you paid it. To-day I 
came into town, I had to have at least one hundred and 
twenty-five dollars. I must have it. Maggie, my wife, is 
sick, dying perhaps. I had to have that money, and I tried 
all round and I couldn’t raise a cent. I was a desperate man 
when you came up that hill. You’ve saved me to-day and 
I’ll not forget it.” Turning before Jim had time to say any¬ 
thing he left for home. 

“We must run up to Grantham’s when we get home. 
There’s trouble there,” said Jim to Mary. 


CHAPTER III 


T here was a larger congregation than usual in the 
country church on Sunday evening. Like most 
churches, especially in the farm districts, there were 
four services on Sunday. At ten in the morning the profes¬ 
sors of religion met and had their experience meeting at which 
they renewed their pledges and exchanged religious views. 
Then Sunday-school convened and then Reverend Story be¬ 
gan his morning sermon. At half-past seven in the winter 
and eight in the summer evenings the evening service was 
held. 

The evening services in this country church, as in all other 
country churches, had larger congregations because the 
farmers had got through with their chores and sometimes 
real work that ran intermittently through Sunday and shut 
out a good many from the morning sermon. The morning 
service also was looked on by the great mass of the non-pro¬ 
fessors as the special appanage of the group of professors, 
and the non-professors were more than willing to turn it over 
to them while they slept late and did their forenoon small 
jobs at their leisure. They reasoned that they did their full 
church duty if they attended in the evening. Also the even¬ 
ing hour was the privileged time for the young people. Then 
the boys dressed up and met the girls who were also in their 
Sunday ribbons and curls and smartest dresses. The girls 
went to church in the evening in their best clothes because 
it was right they should go with their parents and because 
they wanted to go to church anyway. The church to them 
was the great community centre in social things. Its basic 
features were goodness and religious trust and these country 
girls were just naturally good and naturally religious. They 

4 1 


42 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

wanted some Christ in whom they could trust, and the 
minister and the church promised them just that very thing. 
The girls accepted God as their ruler, but Christ was their 
model and everyday teacher. In addition to the religious 
attractions of church the girls knew that the boys would be 
on hand, and on Sunday evening it was rather nice to have 
the boys somewhere around. 

The third contingent of evening regular attenders was the 
brigade of young men and women. These young men had 
got over their rough, impulsive, baseball and road corner 
assembly days and had settled down to serious thoughts and 
actions regarding some particular young woman, and the 
young women had passed through their giggling, hoydenish, 
schoolgirl flocking days and were willing to be the older sister 
with a transient beau or a regular sweetheart. In the olden 
days these couples of young men and women came in buggies 
to church. Sometimes it was a single buggy with one exclu¬ 
sive couple; which usually meant a serious state of affairs in 
social life. Sometimes it was a big double buggy filled with 
couples, mixed and yet separate, for each young woman had 
her particular young man help her in and out of the high seat 
and see that her white skirt didn’t sweep the dust from the 
wheels. This was not evidence of so serious a nature as 
engagement rings or the single buggy outings, but it had un¬ 
limited development prospects and the doubt as to the out¬ 
come made such parties all the more acceptable to the princi¬ 
pal actors and the general gossiping public. These buggy 
days had gone by and the auto days had come, but although 
Reverend Story’s evening congregation had been hard hit 
by the auto competition he had held his own pretty well. 
The auto had closed hundreds of country churches, scattered 
the congregations over all the paved ends of the earth in 
fast-rolling, dust-raising machines and turned the church 
buildings into cheese factories and garages with oil stations 
in front where white-coated young men pumped gasoline 
into tanks and filled oil receptacles. Two of Reverend 
Story’s former pastorates had thus suffered and he was thank- 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 43 

ful that he had been able to withstand the shock and hold as 
many of his people as he was doing. He still had a fair audi¬ 
ence every Sunday morning, a good-sized and enthusiastic 
Sunday-school, and a church full every Sunday evening. 

The large crowd on this particular Sunday evening might 
be accounted for by the fine weather or by the fact that 
probably many people sensed something in the air on the 
subject of the coming wedding. At least they could see Jim 
and Mary in church and this was a particular appeal to the 
feminine part of the congregation. No one knows why it is or 
how the wedding instinct came to grow as part of the feminine 
nature but the fact is that in all lands and climes, civilized 
and uncivilized, the wedding is the greatest event in feminine 
life. It is the climax day of the evolution of femininity. 
The toddling baby hugging her rag doll; the schoolgirl with 
her hazy dreams; the young woman with her extravagant 
ideals; the married woman with the sacrifices and satisfactions 
of motherhood; the grandmother with her many cherished 
domestic remembrances, all revolve around a central point of 
existence, the wedding day; the day that is looked forward 
to, that is realized, that is remembered, that is very fittingly 
but altogether unconsciously exalted to the chiefest pedestal 
among all feminine days. In her wedding robes femininity 
stands at the vestibule of evolutionary fate. Beyond may 
be lyric musical comedy, a joyous dance along flower-strewn 
paths to a sunlit garden of retirement or a common, drab 
drama of mulling, every-day existence or mayhap a cloud- 
darkened tragedy with no ray of light in all the gloom. 
And curious it may seem, but it does seem to be so, that the 
self-same wedding day is only an incident, perhaps a serious 
incident, perhaps not so serious, in the career of the man be¬ 
side her who goes through the self-same ceremony. 

Probably this exaltation of wedlock was the cause of 
the overflowing congregation in Reverend Story’s church 
out in the country on this particular Sunday evening. At 
any rate, when Jim and Mary came in and walked to their 
seats halfway up in the middle tier of pews the church was al- 


44 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

ready filled. Shortly afterward Judge and Mrs. Albright 
and Mr. and Mrs. Morton came in together and sat in the pew 
behind them. 

The air was hazy with the peaceful peace of the well- 
regulated country house of worship when all the environments 
are natural. The church members, who were the professors, 
were all in the front pews, elected to that position of honor 
unanimously by their own choice and the choice of the other 
elements of the congregation. The halfway professors, the 
almost but not yet full church members, were in the middle 
pews, and the openly non-religious general public were in the 
rear where unanimous designation placed them. Families 
grouped themselves automatically according to the religious 
sense and fitness of things. No one told Deacon Rogers and 
his wife and girl and somewhat wayward son to goto the right- 
hand front pew, but they went there. No one directed 
Will Dalton and his daughter, May, to the middle left, but 
they went there, and Phil Ransdell and Jake Haaslem went 
without directions straight to the rear. There were no sheep 
and no goats, but there were religious division lines drawn in 
rounding curves all through the house like isothermal lines 
on a regulation school wall map, and people guided by in¬ 
stinct and intuition sat on one side or the other above a line 
or below a line without taking thought. 

Each of the professors had done the usual thing as they came 
in; kneeled down in the pew and hid their faces in their hands 
and said a silent prayer of about a minute’s length. Both 
men and women did this. Letitia Bayne, twenty years old, 
came in with the rest of her family. She was a professor; they 
were not. They turned into a half rear pew and sat down. 
She went ahead to the very front and said her silent prayer 
before sitting down. If any professor hadn’t done this, it 
would have been noted by all the non-professors and made a 
subject for neighborhood remark. It was the identifying 
sign of the society of professors and it had a reverential effect, 
the public acknowledgment of God by the individual and an 
open notice that this was God’s house. There was no sham 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 45 

or hypocrisy in it, for these country people believed in religi¬ 
ous ritual. 

Mrs. Story came in as usual five minutes before eight and 
said her silent minute prayer and took her front seat directly 
before the pulpit. She was the herald of the minister always 
and in exactly five minutes he came in quietly from the door 
of his church study and went up three steps to the pulpit 
and also said his silent prayer. He stepped forward behind 
the desk and said: “we will begin the worship of God to-night 
by singing hymn number ninety-eight, ‘Jesus, Lover of My 
Soul/ ” and he read the first verse. There was no choir; 
only Violet Nichols, the amateur organist, to distract atten¬ 
tion. The congregation was the choir. Deacon White had 
been a singing school teacher and led the singing in the church 
meetings. Mrs. Story had a splendid contralto voice. The 
minister was a good singer himself. Scattered through the 
congregation were some good voices, and it was the custom 
for everybody to join in the singing; and even the rear pews 
did it reverently. New words and new music were un¬ 
known. The old, old, standby hymns were the only ones 
used and this was the one part of the services in which the 
non-religious and even the few irreligious took active part. 
Gus Hartzell, the Swiss jeweler, a trained musician, the 
possessor of a cultivated voice, could always be heard leading 
the rear left from his far-away corner. The music rolled 
and echoed melodiously as the many differing voices blended. 
The active participation of everyone begot comradeship 
and sociability. It was “our” church service; not “the” 
church service of a dozen paid choir singers. They were not 
an audience; they were a congregation. 

The fashionable choirs of the city basilicas never made 
Christian melody or Christian fellowship or Christian spirit¬ 
uality for the wondering throngs that listened curiously and 
perhaps critically to their finished song spectacle as this 
mixed and heart-zealous congregation did in its unified sing¬ 
ing of the old, old song: “Jesus, Lover of My Soul.” The 
minister prayed along the line of thought of the hymn. The 


46 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

congregation knelt in their pews. It was the custom. When 
an individual did not kneel but leaned forward with his face 
covered by his hand it was very noticeable. The minister 
read a chapter from the New Testament; the collection was 
taken up by the deacons, another hymn was sung, and the 
minister began his sermon on the text: “Ask and ye shall 
receive.” It was a straightforward plea to the individual 
who would be a Christian to do his assigned part in the re¬ 
demption plan; actively to seek divine help; actively to ful¬ 
fil his Christian duties; actively to interest himself or herself in 
Christian lines of work. If the seeker did his or her part, 
actively, zealously, christianly, God would never fail in His 
response. Reverend Story put his forty-years’ pulpit pre¬ 
paration and experience into this sermon and each auditor 
thought he was talking directly to him or to her. 

At its close instead of following the usual custom he ex¬ 
tended his hands heavenward and while the congregation 
bowed he implored the blessing of God on the weary hearts 
that were hungering and thirsting for righteousness and find¬ 
ing no relief in the world and its affairs. “And now,” he said 
as he ceased his prayer and lowered his extended hands to the 
level of the people before him, “let us each and all bow our 
heads and pray silently for a few minutes for divine help 
and if there is any storm-tossed soul that would go to the 
very foot of the Cross; to the Throne of God to-night and 
ask for His omnipotent help let them come forward to the 
altar while we all pray to the God who never fails the earnest 
seeker.” 

The air was tense with the psychologic influences of the 
religious drama. The appeal of the sermon and the short 
prayer and the invitation to the altar killed irresolution, 
and Jim took Mary’s arm and they went forward and knelt 
at the altar in the dead silence of the silent prayer. Jim’s 
mother, seated just behind him, noted the movement. A 
moment’s hesitation on her part and she went forward, too, 
and knelt by her boy. The contagion of religious enthusiasm 
spread rapidly in the electrically charged atmosphere. 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 47 

Mary’s mother slipped out of her seat and knelt by her girl. 
A moment more and Judge Albright took John Morton’s 
arm and together they went forward and joined the family 
group. Others threw off their restraint, and in a few mo¬ 
ments the front of the altar was filled with the kneeling peni¬ 
tents, men and women and boys and girls who had gone to 
church that night without any thought of professing Chris¬ 
tian faith. The minister went quietly along the kneeling 
line, took the hand of each, and whispered words of en¬ 
couragement. Then he asked the audience to sing one verse 
of “Just as I am without one plea.” For a few moments 
there was a short song and prayer service in which leading 
church members took part. 

When this was finished the minister spoke again, saying: 
“Now I am going to ask those at the altar who feel that the 
influence of the Holy Ghost has lighted their pathway some¬ 
what to the foot of the Cross to arise and all the people will 
come forward and congratulate those who have the courage 
of religious conviction and the faith actively to seek God.” 
There was a spontaneous movement forward and a general 
hearty handshaking which the church members led. Then 
the minister asked if any of those who had enlisted under the 
banner of Christ wished to say anything in testimony of 
their faith. 

At once Jim stood up. “My friends,” he said, “I am here 
to publicly but reverently acknowledge the God of Israel as 
my God; to acknowledge that I realize that Christ died to 
save me and mine; to pledge myself to pray and seek salva¬ 
tion knowing that this is the way of eternal life. I am going 
to make the Christian church my church; Christian people 
my kind of people; Christian practices my practice; the 
Christian faith my faith, and the Christian life the life I will 
try to live, and I will not rest till I know that Christ did not 
die in vain for me; that I am saved through him. I’m glad 
of the opportunity to stand up in the face of the world and 
acknowledge my faith. Our minister would probably say it 
is my duty. I feel now that it is a high privilege, and to my 


48 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

friends here who hold back I say come forward, publicly ac¬ 
knowledge your God and your Savior. I feel that it is the 
beginning of a long and happy journey; that we who have 
started on it to-night have the invisible influences of Christian¬ 
ity with us; that these influences are powerful and sustaining 
forces; that the spirit of hope beckons us; that the spirit of 
faith guards us; that we have the active support and help of 
all the visible and invisible forces of righteousness among 
men. It is a privilege, not a burden or a drawback to be a 
Christian, and I am going to put my trust in God and Christ 
and ask their help day by day to live the Christian life as God 
and Christ directs. Come with us, friends. Come forward, 
all of you. Let us make this valley unanimously Christian.” 

His earnest, forceful little talk started a second wave of 
enthusiasm that was even more pronounced than the first. 
Others moved forward till more than half the congregation 
was at the front. Many were willing to follow Jim’s lead and 
testify to their faith and did so. Verses were sung, short 
prayers made, visitors from the front went back to the rear 
and made personal appeals to relatives and friends to come 
forward and for an hour it was a local pentecost. Reverend 
Story skilfully directed the religious surge and when he dis¬ 
missed the congregation the wave was still high and rolling 
christianward and churchward. One thing was very plain. 
The converts at the front were very militant. They were 
not afraid to fight the battles of their faith if battles need be 
fought. Reverend Story was going to have strong support 
in his future pastorate. Jim and Mary had started a little 
crusade; and it was a really happy throng that left the build¬ 
ing and went out in the cold air to face the world in a new 
role to-morrow. The Mortons and the Albrights went over 
to John Morton’s and for the first time in his life John Mor¬ 
ton made a short family prayer after Mary had read a chapter 
from an old family Bible while the two families knelt in a 
group in the parlor. Reverend and Mrs. Story didn’t go 
to sleep for hours. They had a little revival convention all 
to themselves when they got home. New hopes were high; 


49 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

new plans were laid; the North River valley was a new world 
and it was to be redeemed. The minister went to sleep with 
a smile on his face. 

The next morning was Monday, and as each convert wa¬ 
kened up in his or her home the test of meeting the world met 
them face to face. There was no escape; no dodging the or¬ 
deal. The back pews had been dazed the night before by the 
fervor of the scene in the church and the front brigade had the 
influence of the community excitement to sustain them, but 
this morning the mass excitement was gone and they faced 
the great, cold, curious, and somewhat doubting world alone. 
Many of them found they were the only professors in their 
family. All of them found the neighborhood tongues wagging 
about the revival. It was a tribute to the earnestness of the 
participants that every one of them stood firm; stood by their 
open profession of faith and emphasized it when necessary. 


CHAPTER IV 


T HE next morning Jim was out in the field alone look¬ 
ing over the ground and planning for the future twelve 
months when Lew Delker drove up in the road beside 
him. Jim had got acquainted with Delker when he was 
going to business college and had known him as a brilliant 
fellow from somewhere in the South who had some sort of a 
government job and was good company at all times. He had 
the habit of being cynical almost to bitterness in his talk and 
through it all usually ran an expression of dissatisfaction 
with his lot in life. “He’s a flouter,” said one of the com¬ 
pany one night in speaking of him. “He flouts the funda¬ 
mentals of religion and justice and honesty and the social 
organization of to-day.” The verdict so fitted Delker that 
it was unanimously adopted as it was expressed, but still 
Delker had ability and good companion qualities and his talk 
was only taken at the face value of talk anyway and he re¬ 
mained a welcome guest among his fellows. 

“Hello, Jim,” he said as he stopped his roadster, “how 
are you ?” 

“Fine,” said Jim. “I see you’re roaming round our back 
country.” 

“Yes. I wanted to get away from the blooming city with 
its hard heart and cold glare, from all its million eyes and 
its restaurant meals. Do you know I’d rather have bread 
and butter at home than a porterhouse steak in a big garish 
eating house on Broadway.” 

“Well, why don’t you get a home of your own then and en¬ 
joy life?” said Jim. 

“Oh, I don’t know,” said Delker as he lolled back on the 
cushions and half smiled at Jim who had climbed up on the 

So 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 51 

fence to take it easy while he visited. “I suppose economic 
reasons, and yet there are two score fellows right around me 
in the city old enough to get married, salary enough to pay 
expenses, yet eating at these restaurant places. It costs us 
just as much to live as if we had a household of our own. 
I guess it’s not altogether our fault either; it’s the system, and 
the system is partly built on economics and partly on other 
kinks in the body social. It seems as if both young men and 
young women have other ambitions now than to settle down 
at nineteen and raise a family of kids, a whole houseful of 
them as our fathers did before us. We want to graduate and 
then we want to take a post-graduate course and then some¬ 
thing else. Till fifteen we’re in the common school and till 
nineteen in the high school and if we have to earn money for 
ourselves we’re in the university till twenty-eight or thirty 
and then we’re turned loose dead broke to start in life and 
we find we don’t know a blessed thing that’s practical or that 
a man can live on and we have to start over again and learn 
something useful for which we can get bread and butter. It 
takes us six years to get our bearings and three more to get to 
the independence line and then we’re so old and cranky and 
super-critical that marriage is a side issue. At twenty we’re 
stuck on a girl because she’s a nice something that we like, 
that has sympathies with us and we have sympathies with. 
We understand them or think we do, which is a dreadfully 
wrong conclusion; and they understand us or think they do, 
which they don’t. However, there’s enough similar sym¬ 
pathies and understandings among the twenty-year-olds 
that married life between them is just like two pet calves 
frolicking around together in the blossom-scented clover field 
and journeying up to the corner trough side by side twice a 
day to drink sweet milk. But at thirty-two or thirty-five or 
forty it’s different. The economic question bobs up, and 
other things, many of them. But I’ve this theory: that if 
men meet women at any age and women meet men so that 
they can get thoroughly acquainted they’ll get married. 
It just needs enough propinquity. The intimate acquain- 


52 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

tanceship, the being thrown together for a time is what 
is needed and what is lacking; the man never meets the 
woman and the woman never meets the man and they live 
apart in their lonesomeness.” 

“And that means restaurant and hotel life.” 

“Exactly so. And say, you fellows on the farm have all 
the best of us restaurant life convicts. When I get rich I’m 
going to choose the best place on earth to board: where they 
have a big farm and a big house and grow horses and cattle 
and sheep and have any quantity of milk and butter and eggs 
and where there’s a good-sized family and a hired man or two. 
Especially I want a place where there’s a big, stout, good- 
natured, womanly farmer’s wife who has raised or is raising 
a family of boys and girls, some of whom are grown, helping 
around the farm. If you’re a young man boarder you want 
at least one grown daughter in the family; if you’re a young 
lady boarder you want one or two grown sons. A farmer’s 
wife like that always makes fat pies, big fat pies, and there’s 
no stint of anything about the place. It’s always feast day 
and everything is put on the table and you take what you 
want, not what someone, who doesn’t know, likes to give you. 
No little picayunish side dishes go at that farm. You ladle 
what your wishes wish out of a tureen or fork it off a piled-up 
platter of sliced turkey or ham or spread the butter quarter of 
an inch thick if you want to. And the social life of that 
family is as nearly perfect as you can have it on this earth. 
Plenty radiates happiness. It’s always pinching poverty and 
meagre economy that breeds little, ill-smelling thoughts and 
actions. That’s why I’m meaner than satan. Feed the 
human animal full of good eatables and give it well-fed com¬ 
panionship and it will be healthful and moral and charitable. 
Pinch it with hungry, shivering poverty and starvation and 
it’s mean and sinful and selfish and a grouch. There’s more 
human animal happiness at one of these big farms, where all 
things are plentiful and congenial and where there’s lots of 
work to keep everybody busy, than anywhere else on earth. 

“But don’t ever go to board at a farm where there’s only a 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT S3 

young married couple and the young wife is going in for 
economy. You’ll be sized up and your appetite gauged and 
just enough will be cooked to go round and it will be dished 
out to you and you’re expected to quit when you’re through; 
that is when you’ve eaten all that’s served to you. A woman 
like that is always an expert in serving things out. That’s her 
hobby. You get just so much meat and so much potatoes and 
so on, and when everybody is served once there’s just a little 
meat left and just another spoonful of potatoes and a little of 
each article for appearance’s sake and you’re not expected, no 
matter how hungry you are, to be so unmannerly as to ask 
for that little dab of mashed potatoes you see left in the dish. 
The good lady cooks beans one day and turnips the next 
and potatoes the next and cauliflower the next and when it’s 
beans day you’re expected to eat beans; and you do because 
that’s all there is. You may not like beans, but it’s beans 
or the starvation morgue and the same with turnip and 
potato and cauliflower. The first child in that family has to 
eat by rote and with mathematical certitude. His eating is 
calculated for him on a calculator. The good wife has the 
kid and the boarder to practise on and her combinations of 
thin cheap salads are a tragic substitute for ham and cabbage. 
Give me the sonsy, good natured farm woman; one hundred 
and seventy pounds and forty-eight years old; complexion 
like a farmer’s wife should have; five children, all ages up to 
twenty-three or four, husband and hired man, big farm and 
big house; that’s the greatest place on earth to get fat pies.” 

“And what are you doing now?” asked Jim as he laughed 
out loud at the running monologue. 

“Oh, I’m still a bureaucrat; holding down a government job. 
A bureaucrat is a fellow who bullies the fellow below him 
till he drives him insane and at the same time licks the boots 
of the fellow above him in rank. He wants to govern the 
world by the theory that he learns out of a book. If the world 
refuses to be governed that way it’s so much the worse for 
the world. The book theory is right and can’t be wrong be¬ 
cause there it is in the book. The bureau is his god and re- 


54 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

ports are his bible and ritual of worship. If be bad been in 
Lincoln’s place the army officer who would have sent in the 
nicest, neatest, bureau standardized reports would have got 
the command of the Union Army; licking Lee would have 
been a secondary consideration. Reports and not results 
are what we bureaucrats want. Making and filing reports is 
the chief end of all government, and we bureaucrats will con¬ 
tinue to work to that end. We’ll get to our offices at nine 
thirty a.m. and work as busy as bees till four thirty P.M., with 
an hour off for lunch, bullying the fellow below us and licking 
the boots of the fellows above us. That’s our real work. 
Making and filing reports is our official work and we do it 
by instinct.” 

“I catch your idea,” said Jim. “My thoughts were rather 
hazy on that particular subject, but now I comprehend.” 

“That’s a sign of genius on my part; to be able to interpret 
and put in verbal form the unregulated thought of humanity. 
In ordinary life I might die in a madhouse where all geniuses 
are supposed to go in the end, but there’s no danger of me 
ever having any brainstorms in my avocation. We’re all 
box cars in our big train and each box car runs along in front 
of the car behind and behind the car in front. A man can’t 
be an engine in that train; neither can he use any initiative; 
if he swings or swerves the least he is jolted good and hard; it 
is the rule of the bureaucratic road. However, it’s mighty 
restful to be in a line of work where there’s always somebody 
to do the thinking for you. I’ve been in a condition of men¬ 
tal servitude so long now that my brain is comatized. If 
I had to think for myself once more I’d go to the mental 
hospital with a few sprained brain convolutions. I don’t 
have to think and I don’t want to think. To be a chrysalis 
wrapped securely in a winding shroud of red tape, that’s a 
worthy ambition; but say, Jim, do you see that line of hills to 
the east, the blue haze hiding all beyond,” and he pointed to 
the Cascade Mountains in the distance. ‘‘Over yonder is 
timber that is timber, trees three hundred and fifty feet high 
and seven feet across, monarchs of the woods; and there’s coal 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 55 

there, too, unlimited quantities. IVe got a scheme for swip¬ 
ing a big bunch of that timber that I can sell for a fortune. 
It may not be exactly legal but it will work. IVe the right 
men in with me who know the game, real land office men, who 
can get it through, shady or no shady. Dummy homestead¬ 
ing is legal on its face.” 

The half-amused expression faded from Jim’s face. “Well, 
Delker, someone has to swear good and hard in homesteading 
and there’s the penitentiary. Stealing government timber 
by crooked work is risky. Why take the risk ?” 

“I know it’s no child’s game, but I’m not a child, and our 
people know the way around. I see you don’t want to be in 
on it and I’m not going to offer you a part in the campaign 
and a good share of the swag as I intended when I came here. 
To me the reward is big if we win; it’s a fortune, and I’ll win. 
Others have swiped timber and coal from this old government 
of ours and I don’t see why I shouldn’t; provided I do it ac¬ 
cording to technical law. If it isn’t exactly ethical according 
to the rules of the Ten Commandments it will be legal on the 
surface at least.” 

“But it isn’t honest, and honesty pays in dollars and 
cents.” 

“A fig for your honesty. I’m only beating the govern¬ 
ment and that’s no crime if you get away with it. We only 
have a very few years in this world. It’s necessary to my 
personal happiness that I be rich. Riches mean power 
and other things of high value to me in my life. There’s our 
old government holding up that coal and timber like a tight¬ 
wad. Fellows have been stealing it for fifty years. The coun¬ 
try is full of rich respectable coal and timber thieves riding 
round in their automobiles. Why should I walk with dusty 
shoes and frayed trouser legs ?” 

“Yes, but you owe something to yourself and your family 
if you ever have one. You can’t lie and steal and be a crim¬ 
inal or a semi-criminal and keep your own self-respect, your 
own good opinion of yourself, and that’s worth more than 
gold to me. I want to be able to look in the looking glass 


56 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

every morning and every evening and say to the fellow I see 
there: ‘You’re an honest man.’” 

“Well, Jim, I’m different. I’ll sort of get along with myself 
amiably and agreeably providing I have the good gold. I’ll 
not censure myself so severely about the way it is obtained 
that I’ll be quarreling with myself. I want to look in the 
looking glass every morning and every evening and be able 
to say to the fellow I see there: ‘You’re rich, old fellow, and 
getting richer every twenty-four hours.’ I don’t care a 
fig how I get it so long as I can roll past the penitentiary doors 
in my twelve-cylinder auto. I want to get the source of all 
earthly power and human happiness; gold, yellow gold, and 
lots of it. ‘While I’m gittin’ I’ll try and git a plenty.’” 

“But what will the world think of you? That good opin¬ 
ion is essential, isn’t it?” 

“I care nothing what the world thinks. The world can’t 
read my thoughts, can it? Or delve into the secrets of my 
safety deposit box in the biggest bank in the city?” 

“It can pretty nearly do so. It’s surprising how near the 
world sizes a man up. A whole lot of people think they’re 
hiding their real character from the view of all men but 
they’re not. I don’t know a single individual who comes in 
contact with this big world that the world doesn’t know 
thoroughly. He may think the reputation he advertises for 
himself is accepted by the world as his character, but he is the 
one who is badly mistaken. He is the one who is blind and 
not the world. It may take the world a few years, but 
finally his real character filters through the sieve of his physi¬ 
cal and mental makeup and he stands out in plain view pic¬ 
tured on the public screen; and he is seen just as he is, not as 
he wished to be seen, not as he advertises himself. You 
can’t be dishonest without the world knowing it. Every man 
is known as he really is; he is sized up, and he can’t work any 
sort of deception that will conceal his real entity. Worldly 
intuition as to character of individuals is instinct and its con¬ 
clusions are as true as instinct. You’ll be known, all right.” 

“I don’t believe it. Besides, it’s an act of Christian charity 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 57 

to my future family to beat the game and make money if I 
can when the ordinary ways of getting rich are insufficient 
in the short time allotted. I don’t mind beating the govern¬ 
ment if I can do so safely. The criminality is all included 
in the two words ‘getting caught.’ Never get caught with 
the goods. I’d trade reputation or character either for safe 
gold any time if I have to. Out yonder is timber; out yonder 
is coal; here are provinces of land that will make fortunes 
for the men who have the nerve to handle them. Over 
yonder to the west are fortunes in fish and other fortunes in 
shipping. There are unlimited fortunes lying all around us. 
The biggest kind of fortunes are oozing out of Canada right 
now in bottles and cases and barrels, going right by our 
doors. We can grab some of these fortunes if we are wide 
awake; if we are willing to take even ordinary chances. 
We’re in the land of the greatest opportunities on this earth 
and I’m going to get rich before they fade away. I’ll get 
it honestly enough so that I’ll glide past the doors of the 
government bastile and that’ll be all I care for. I’m going to 
be rich and respectable, which is the same thing practically, 
even if I have to skid around the edges of eternity on the two 
outside tires in cutting corners to get there quick. 

“As for the world you speak of, I can buy all the sociability 
and trade and votes I need if I have money. I can buy a 
cushioned pew in the fashionable church; a recommendation 
from the pastor; an entrance to a society club; a fashionable 
wife and a place for her at the bridge gambling tables of the 
elect and the votes for an office of public trust and honor, even 
to the United States senatorship, if I have the million to do it 
with, and no one will ever ask me where I got the million. 
Without the million I get nothing and am less than nothing, 
just an ordinary plodding citizen, and that’s zero, a big, 
roundish eggshaped cipher. I’d rather be permanently dead 
than permanently poor. Obliteration is preferable to stag¬ 
nated existence, the dreary routine of the crab at the bottom 
of the ocean. Give me riches or give me annihilation, utter 
and final annihilation.” 


58 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

“Well, we differ. Your ideals are all linked with gilded 
palaces; with a life of contentment based solely on yellow 
gold. I believe otherwise. I want enough of this world’s 
goods of all kinds so the world can’t trample on me. I think 
every man owes it to himself and his family to get that 
much ahead in money and in property. We should be so 
independent in worldly goods that we can say to our fellow 
man: ‘I’m not your servant. I’ll do my own thinking and act 
at all times and under all conditions as I think right myself.’ 
Beyond that line gold brings nothing of happiness or content. 
Family affection, contentment, happiness, real pleasure, de¬ 
pend nothing on wealth. You can’t buy them. You can’t 
buy character. You can’t buy even lasting reputation. 
No man or set of men can degrade me or lower me one hair’s 
breadth, but I can degrade myself and lower myself by my 
own acts and thoughts and I do it when I take a dishonest 
dollar or even seriously consider taking it. You can’t buy 
public office and hold it permanently. I’d rather have the 
real love of the girl I’m going to marry than all the yellow gold 
in the United States treasury, which is nearly four billions. 
I know I couldn’t buy that love with the four billions or 
any other fabulous sum. The real worthwhile things in this 
world can’t be bought. They’re not for sale at any price. 
What you can buy with yellow gold is only the tawdry imi¬ 
tation of the real worthwhile things. What you can thus 
buy doesn’t satisfy, it brings to your possession only a tawdry 
imitation of contentment or happiness, not the real thing.” 

“Well, Jim, I see you’re built differently from me in 
theory at least, but if I put up a tangible proposition to you 
it might take on a different color. At the present moment 
there’s a stream of wealth going by your door here on the 
North River. It can be tapped as it goes by and a thousand 
dollars a month turned into your pockets. You wouldn’t 
see where it came from or who it came from, but it would 
come sure and permanent and without risk to you. Do you 
want to open your pockets and let this stream run in by 
force of natural gravity or do you not?” 


59 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

For a moment there was dead silence as Jim looked straight 
into the face of his friend, and Delker returned the look with¬ 
out a wink. 

“Do you mean whiskey?” said Jim in a low tone. 

“Exactly, whiskey. It’s coming by the carload down this 
road every night from Canada. Truckloads are whirling 
by while you sleep. It is bonded stuff, good goods. Some 
of it comes direct from the distilleries of Europe, some has 
been withdrawn from the bonded warehouses in the United 
States, shipped into Canada in carload lots and is now com¬ 
ing back in auto trucks through here and in boats and 
launches on the Sound just to the west. I’m not the agent of 
the people who are making the fortunes by this traffic, but I 
heard confidentially that they wanted a stopping place on the 
North River where your barn stands. I heard this and I 
heard how much there would be in it for you, and the price 
might be raised. You have this barn and the piece of land 
along the river just such as the big fellows want to use for 
cache purposes; a midway stopping place. Think it over. 
Take your time. If you want one thousand dollars a month 
or perhaps a larger amount without the slightest personal 
risk for yourself you can have it. You know nothing of 
what is going on if you agree; you get your money regularly; 
ask no questions and get no information with it. No one 
on earth would know anything of any part you had in the 
inflow. It would be as secret as the secret of the sphinx 
and would be as unrevealable. ,, 

For another minute Jim looked away across the fields. 
Then he said slowly: “A thousand dollars per month would 
be a big item for me, Delker, and you say my part in this 
wholesale bootlegging scheme would be a dead secret. Let 
me ask you something: Last night there were church ser¬ 
vices down at our little church out here in the country. I 
went forward to the altar and prayed to God to forgive my 
transgressions of the past and guide me in the future so that I 
might do only the things He would approve. Do you think 
my part in this criminal bootlegging scheme you outline so 


6o 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

favorably would be a secret to God ? Wouldn’t He know my 
every thought connected with it and see my every bootleg¬ 
ging act? Could I keep the knowledge of my thoughts and 
acts away from him, and if I couldn’t keep the knowledge of 
my criminality from Him and He knew of it, all of it even my 
own secret thoughts, would He approve it? Could I kneel 
to-night and ask God to endorse this wholesale bootlegging 
that is being done in defiance of His law and the law of the 
United States?” 

Delker’s face changed color more than once as Jim went on 
slowly with this statement, weighing every word before he 
spoke it. He could find no answer. At last he straightened 
up in his roadster, started it up, turned around in the road 
and glided back to where Jim was seated, and stopped. 
44 Good-by, Jim; you’re altogether impossible.” He touched 
the starting button, the car jumped ahead and he went down 
the road in a cloud of dust. 

“ Who was that in the very swift auto that you were talking 
to for so long this morning?” asked Mary when Jim had come 
to the house. “He went down the road past here seemingly 
at a mile a minute.” 

“That was Lew Delker.” Jim noticed a shade pass over 
Mary’s face at the mention of the name. “Don’t you like 
him?” asked Jim. 

“I don’t think I do. He’s too cynical; jokes too much 
about religion and honesty and goodness. I don’t think I 
like a joke about sacred things. Perhaps I don’t like him 
because he’s a different temperament. I’m a decided blonde; 
he’s a decided brunette.” 

“And what has that to do with it?” 

“Everything, I think. I have always noticed that my real 
chummy friends were blondes or of a tinge that had a shade 
of blondness and I have noticed that this is the rule of life. 
Like temperaments choose like temperaments. The rule is 
entirely different with regard to size. Big men seem to like 
little women and tall women choose a short man if they can 
find him. I suppose this is nature’s plan of averaging up the 


6i 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

stature of the race and it always looked quite natural to see a 
six-foot-two man choosing a five-foot tiny mite of femininity 
to take care of through life. This is a matter of stature, not 
of temperament, and opposites in stature seem to agree like 
turtle doves. In fact, the strong man seems to want some 
frail little feminine helpmate and wouldn’t be satisfied with a 
masculine woman who could take care of herself. And the 
big strong masculine woman seems to want some weak-kneed 
little brother who needs bossing and would not be satisfied 
if he wasn’t bossed and is perfectly satisfied with the wife 
who can do the bossing. 

“But where the decided blonde meets the decided brunette 
there is apt to be antipathy either partial or complete. I 
have seen so much of this that I have come to believe that 
every man or woman is surrounded by his or her own in¬ 
dividual physical and spiritual influence that follows them 
wherever they go and is always with them as an impercepti¬ 
ble cloud. It might be called the individual’s temperamental 
ether. Men and women of coarse spiritual fibre have a 
cloud of coarse temperamental ether or individual influence 
in their surrounding atmosphere and the fine-fibred, sensitive 
individual, whether man or woman, throws out a cloud of 
finer temperamental etheric influence. When these two 
individuals meet there is either repulsion or affinity between 
their temperamental influences. That’s what creates likes 
and dislikes. I have often noticed that if a person of fine 
sensibility was in proximity to another of obvious coarse 
sensibility in a street car or any of the proximities of daily 
life and the presence of the coarser person was repellent or 
even perceptibly odious, if a newspaper or a book were 
raised between the parties the painful odiousness of the 
coarser presence was dispelled. It disappeared. In other 
words, it was cut off by the material obstacle. If there was 
no material object to cut off the coarse temperamental in¬ 
fluence, the other party couldn’t forget their presence or the 
annoyance they were. 

“I have noticed, too, that there are strangers as well as 


62 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

friends whose presence is always a pleasure even if I have 
never spoken to them. And this affinity or repulsion doesn’t 
depend on clothes or riches or poverty or good looks or ill 
looks or station in life; it seems to arise entirely from the dis¬ 
tinctive individual spiritual and physical aura that sur¬ 
rounds them, their temperamental influence, that affinitized 
or repelled a temperamental influence of my own. I have 
noticed, too, that very sensitive, fine-fibred people showed 
this affinity or repellence as a highly developed element of 
their personality while coarse-fibred people didn’t recognize 
its existence under the same circumstances. Some sensitive 
people dislike to shake hands with those of an opposite coarse 
temperament while at the very same time the coarse tempera¬ 
ment doesn’t seem to recognize any distinction in handshak¬ 
ing. Mr. Delker is certainly an opposite temperament to 
myself and it may be for that reason I don’t like him, al¬ 
though for the sake of common courtesy we can be friendly 
enough.” 

“I guess you’re right, little girl. I think there is a good 
deal in your theory. We all have noticed these things to a 
certain extent.” 


CHAPTER V 


T HE next morning the Mortons were up early. The 
wedding program had all been arranged; planned out 
at a supper meeting of the two families a few days 
previous that lasted from the time the chores were done in 
the evening till bedtime. 

Jim and Mary, as Judge and Mrs. Albright put it; or Mary 
and Jim as Mr. and Mrs. Morton phrased it, were to be 
married at ten that morning. They were to be driven into 
the city by the old folks of the two families and were to take 
the boat for a trip down the coast of Washington and Oregon 
and perhaps California. They were to be gone from home 
for one, two, three, or four weeks, just as they wished. They 
were to go as far as they made up their minds on the journey 
they would like to go, and would get back when they got 
back. 

There wasn’t going to be any dinner before they left. 
They were farmer folks and would have their breakfast at 
their homes and this was to be a common-sense wedding. 
It was usual, they knew, to have a big spread on such oc¬ 
casions with all the women working themselves to death for 
a week before the time set getting pantryfuls of eatables 
baked up and cooked up, with cakes and pies and chickens 
and meats of various kinds, so that a loud-voiced and loud- 
acting assembly could gather in their Sunday clothes and 
gorge to the accompaniment of forced and stupid animal 
gaiety. But the Albrights and the Mortons were not of the 
country animal variety of people. This marriage to them 
was a somewhat sacred event and they intuitively wanted to 
preserve its sacredness. It was not an occasion for loud, 
forced jokes and loud, forced feeding. They wanted the 

63 


6 4 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

wedding to be public and publicly proclaimed. They wanted 
all the world to know that Jim and Mary were going to be 
married and establish a home that had never been in exis¬ 
tence before in accordance with the most civilized manner 
of establishing new homes. They wanted the public to 
know and acknowledge this new home when it was estab¬ 
lished, but they didn’t want any vulgar guzzling or vulgar 
guffaws echoing in their parlors or dining rooms at the marri¬ 
age that was preliminary to the new home. 

The two families agreed they would eat their breakfasts 
at their respective homes; they would meet with their few 
invited friends in the Morton parlor and at ten o’clock Mary 
and Jim or Jim and Mary would be married by Reverend 
Story, all quietly and fittingly as became these two better 
class families, and then, quietly and fittingly, Mary and Jim 
or Jim and Mary were to be driven to town. There was to 
be neither secrecy nor display. 

In the Morton household everything in the work line had 
been well planned. A dressmaker had come from the city 
and worked for the past few days helping out and had gone 
into the city with Mary and her mother on their shopping 
tours to give advice. The dresses had been made in time 
and were ready for the eventful day. The flowers had come 
from the florist’s and were blooming in their vases. The 
bouquets were on hand. The parlor was brightened and 
decorated in various ways known to femininity. Mrs. Morton 
knew exactly what she wanted done and it had already been 
done. She and Mary and the hired girl did the breakfast 
dishes as usual and Mary began to prepare for ten o’clock. 
Mrs. Morton busied herself here and there helping Mary and 
putting the finishing touches on the household arrangements. 
More than once she caught herself standing and looking into 
the future when her girl would not be with her and the house 
would have a great emptiness, but it was easy to arouse her¬ 
self from these spells, for the girl was still here and besides 
there was work to do here, there, and everywhere. Over at 
the Albright home she knew Jim’s mother was acting just 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 65 

the same; feeling just the same about the coming loss of Jim 
in the home as she felt about the coming loss of Mary. 
There was going to be a heartachy void, an unfillable vacancy 
to the mothers in the deserted room in both homes, and these 
two neighbor women with the iron-gray hair and the 
motherly ways were each bravely trying to forget the unfor¬ 
gettable loneliness that was only a few hours away in the 
doing of the little things in which a mother’s love found an 
unalloyed satisfaction. 

Jim had made a few flying trips between the two houses 
and had waved to Mary from the barn several times and 
at nine-thirty he and his parents drove up with his luggage 
for the trip piled in the rear seat of the auto. 

There was the friendly, everyday greetings between the two 
families and Jim hunted Mary up in the kitchen and helped 
or hindered her in various preparations for the journey. 
Then they all went in to see and admire Mrs. Morton’s ar¬ 
rangement of the wedding scene and the women all got busy 
on one thing or another and there was a last union meeting 
talk regarding the trip to the cities of the South. 

One thing was not yet mentioned and that was a very 
precious secret to the women. Jim had given orders to the 
engraver to put in small script at the very bottom of the 
wedding invitations: “No wedding presents.” “I won’t 
invite my friends to any social holdup,” he said in explana¬ 
tion. “A wedding present from an invited guest is a cheap 
customized imposition; just a mean, petty, designed little 
piece of financial trickery, and I’ll have none of it.” But his 
perfectly plain talk didn’t apply to the folks at home, and 
the old folks of each family had bought presents for Mary 
and Jim separately and then had clubbed together and 
bought a joint present for them, and each of the mothers had 
an individual present for her only child and Jim had one for 
Mary and Mary one for Jim. No one knew what the other had 
in store for the occasion except in the case of the community 
present. Each individual had suspicions of what might come 
to light later, but no one knew anything for certain except that 


66 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

they themselves had a present hid away till after the cere¬ 
mony. 

The dozen invited guests arrived rapidly after nine-thirty 
and as each came in a bouquet was pinned on the lapel of 
each of the men’s coats and a splendid white rose on the 
corsage of each of the women by Mrs. Morton and Mrs. Al¬ 
bright. The house was soon filled with chatter after the 
arrival of Reverend and Mrs. Story who were welcomed by 
all as the special guests and were duly decorated by Mary 
herself. Precisely as the old clock with the two shiny brass 
columns on either side on the mantel toned out ten Reverend 
Story said: “The great hour has arrived.” The general 
conversation ceased. Mrs. Morton flung open the parlor 
doors and the minister led the way. His place was indicated 
by the arrangements. A small table with the family Bible 
in the center and a vase of bright blossoms at each end had 
been placed before the fireplace. Flowers were on all sides 
and filled the air with perfume. The little room was very 
tastefully decorated, one thing being very noticeable, that 
it was not over-decorated. 

Jim and Mary walked to the center, facing the minister 
across the table. Jim’s father and mother stood to the right; 
Mary’s to her left; the guests around the rear. It looked like 
a wedding where everyone had a part and something to do to 
help out the ceremony. It was altogether a distinguished- 
looking assemblage. Jim was a young, handsome giant, six 
feet three, well groomed, ruddy colored, gentlemanlike in every 
feature and movement. Mary was a very pretty girl with 
the perfect pink-and-white complexion that is seen only in 
the girls of Ireland and the few other spots on earth like 
Puget Sound where there are soft cloudy skies and moist, 
warm ocean breezes. Puget Sound has just such a climate 
and it had put the finishing lovely tints on Mary’s heritage of 
perfect health. A touch of powder or rouge would have been 
a cosmetic blotch on her face. She wore a light colored cos¬ 
tume that emphasized the charm of the splendid rose bloom 
of her cheeks and the transparent delicacy of intermingled 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 67 

waves of coloring on face and neck. She came just to Jim’s 
shoulder and it seemed a perfect combination of man and 
woman in age, intelligence, training, and physical and 
spiritual affinity. They showed as a centerpiece of exuber¬ 
ant youth and supreme vitality in the midst of the circle of 
men and women the majority of whom had the iron-gray 
hair of the western slope of life. 

Reverend Story had an original wedding ceremony that he 
followed on all occasions. Long years before, when he was 
in the high enthusiasm of his church work, he had discussed 
at a church conference with a few of his fellow ministers the 
subject of the best and most impressive marriage service. 
They had got further than just discussion and had jointly 
drawn up a form to be followed as the best their experience 
could devise. It included seemingly to them all the best 
features of all the common marriage ceremonies and Mr. 
Story had followed it ever since. 

He began with a short address to the young people on the 
marriage relation. He said in part: “The secular law, the 
common legislative law of the land under which we live, 
recognizes the marriage of man and woman as a contract, the 
same kind of a contract as any other binding agreement in 
ordinary commercial life. This is the only recognition given 
to marriage by our state and national laws. It is necessary 
to have the legal, binding, law-enforced contract view of 
marriage because mixed up with the marital relations are the 
rights of children and the rights of the man and woman to the 
use and ownership of property of all kinds. The legal con¬ 
tract of marriage, recognized by our laws, is the foundation 
of parents’ legal rights, children’s legal rights, and household 
property legal rights. The judges of all our courts from the 
local justices of the peace to the supreme court judges are 
authorized to be arbiters in contract cases of all kinds and 
they are therefore authorized to marry men and women, to 
validate the contract between them. From this theory comes 
divorce. If marriage is just a legal contract and nothing 
more, and judges may validate the contract of marriage be- 


68 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

tween a man and a woman, then judges may set the contract 
aside for legal reasons, just as a court of equity can invalidate 
or annul any other contract. 

“Christian ministers and Christian churches and Christian 
people agree to this theory that there is a legal contract in 
marriage that protects children’s rights, family rights, and 
the property rights of all the family, but they disagree with the 
theory and present practice of judges and courts divorcing 
married men and women. The Christian world acquiesces 
in this practice because it is the law of the land, and the Chris¬ 
tian world is always law abiding, but it does not endorse it. 
Acquiescence is not endorsement. The Christian world be¬ 
lieves that the marriage of a man and a woman is a human 
institution established by God and its domain belongs to His 
church; that God instituted marriage; that God commands, 
endorses, sanctifies, and spiritually legalizes the union of man 
and woman and that a legislature or a court should not try to 
annul the union that God Himself has authorized and sancti¬ 
fied. 

“One of the largest Christian churches teaches that marri¬ 
age is a sacrament and that only the ordained priest of the 
church can completely marry men and women; that a marri¬ 
age by a judge of any court is incomplete, and that there can 
be no such thing as divorce as modern practice endorses it. 
There may be a separation for the most serious causes, but 
not such a divorce as is recognized by society in this age. 
This is practically the view of all the orthodox Christian world 
although most of the protestant denominations do not state 
the conclusions so boldly as the Roman Catholic Church 
does. They all contend that marriage is a divine and not 
a man-made institution and is much more than an ordinary 
legal contract and stop there. They disagree with the 
modern divorce as not authorized by God, but assail it only 
by argument and denunciation; not by open rebellion against 
the practice.” 

Then he touched shortly on the new duties and responsibili¬ 
ties that men and women assume through the marriage 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 69 

union: “That one of these duties was for every man and 
woman calmly to survey the whole situation and adjust 
themselves to their new position; that nine out of ten of all 
the domestic jars arose from the neglect of this calm survey 
and calm adjustment. If a man or woman had decidedly 
made up their mind after sober thought that they would 
never forget to be forbearing, never be impatient, and al¬ 
ways remember that it is the little things of married life that 
make married life worth living or make it a weary burden, 
they would be started on the right road in one important 
respect. 

“A sober, preliminary survey, all by themselves, of what 
they should do and what they should not do, always pro¬ 
phesies marital agreement. And they should begin their 
family life at the family altar. The family prayer was the 
harmonizer of all life’s jarring discords; it ironed out all 
marital differences; it dissipated marital troubles as the 
morning sun chased away the mists on the mountain peaks; 
it revealed the bigness of God’s great spiritual universe, and 
the little irritations of daily married life were dwarfed into 
the littleness of an atom of nothing and disappeared even 
from memory. 

“And now,” he continued, “let us begin this family life 
with the prayer of faith,” and raising his hands while the 
listeners bowed their heads he prayed for a moment for the 
blessing of God on this union. He then took a plain gold 
ring from its plush case on the table before him and holding 
it up said: “This ring is a symbol of the purity of the marriage 
relation, for it is the purest refined gold. God has ordained 
this complete purity for the marriage relation. The ring is 
without end; it is symbolical of the life-enduring term of the 
sacred vows you both take here to-day, for it is Mary Mor¬ 
ton’s to wear through all the days to come. God has or¬ 
dained only eternal marriage vows. This ring has neither 
beginning nor end, it is a complete unity, its bright surface 
is without flaw or mark, it is a perfect circle. It symbolizes 
the spiritual union in marriage. God has ordained that the 


7 o BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

spiritual cycle of the perfect marriage shall be a perfect unity 
of thought, of feeling, of sentiment, of holy aspiration, that 
it shall glow with the softly brilliant radiance of divine love. 
And now, James Albright, I ask you to place this symbolical 
ring as your marriage token and a remembrance for all time 
of this blessed hour on the third finger of the left hand of your 
affianced, Mary Morton. And I ask you, James Albright and 
Mary Morton, to join your right hands. James Albright, 
do you take this woman, Mary Morton, for your lawful wife? 
Will you love, honor, and cherish her till death do you part ?” 
“I will,” said Jim. “And, Mary Morton, do you take this 
man, James Albright, to be your lawful husband? Will you 
love, honor, and cherish him till death do you part?” “I 
will,” said Mary. “Then I pronounce you man and wife; 
and they whom God hath joined together let no man put 
asunder,” and again for a moment the minister prayed for 
God’s blessing on the union. 

“Well, the great event is over, Mary Albright, nee Morton, 
I guess I can legally kiss you now,” said Jim, and he did. 
Then Mrs. Morton and Mrs. Albright joined in the kissing 
and the fathers took a helping hand in it and the women 
guests and the men congratulated all around and everybody 
seemed so happy that Mrs. Story began to sing: “Blest Be 
the Tie That Binds,” and two verses of that old standby 
were sung by the guests. At eleven o’clock Jim and Mary 
or Mary and Jim, now Mr. and Mrs. James Albright, were 
whirling along the road toward the city where they were to 
take the boat; the horizon of the new life all aglow ahead of 
them. 

The trip from the boatlanding where they took the boat to 
Seattle was like an afternoon lullaby to Jim and Mary. The 
day was fine; the sea was like glass; the steamer glided along 
through the blue waters without a quiver. Green islands 
were always near on both sides. When one was passed an¬ 
other took its place. The mainland on the left couldn’t be 
distinguished from the succession of islands. The young 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 71 

couple were strangers to all on board. They took chairs aft 
on deck behind the cabin and just enjoyed life in silent, watch¬ 
ful drowsiness. It was like the individual half under the 
influence of ether who knows and notes all that is going on 
but doesn’t care. 

Puget Sound was on its best behavior; as gentle as a little 
child. The boat stopped at only a few points. At Decep¬ 
tion Pass there was somewhat of a thrill. Two islands were 
close together. The tide was rising. The sea rushed be¬ 
tween them like a mighty river. That river had power 
enough to dash a boat ten times the size to pieces. The 
water was churned to foam and eddies whirled around here 
and there with deep caverns in the center. The boat careened 
over on one side and came within its own breadth of one 
rocky shore as it swept swiftly along, but in one minute all 
was over and they were again in the peaceful expanse on the 
other side. They had supper cooked by men and served by 
men which Mary enjoyed as a novelty. They watched the 
lights spring up in the twilight all along the shores, sometimes 
one by one sometimes in groups. 

At last they came in sight of Seattle, a great crescent of danc¬ 
ing lights from Alki Point round to the suburb of Ballard; 
an electric light panorama in a half circle of seven miles, 
that reached back over the hills behind on all sides. 

“ I’ll tell you what we’ll do. We’ll rent a three-room apart¬ 
ment while we’re here instead of going to a hotel,” said Jim 
as they got off the boat. “Any of the bus men can tell us 
where we can find a good apartment house that has transient 
apartments such as we want.” 

“That’ll be fine. It’ll be just like home for us,” said Mary. 
In a few minutes Jim had arranged with a cab driver as to 
where they should go and in ten minutes more they engaged a 
little apartment all furnished for housekeeping and were at 
home. 

“The first thing we have to do is to get eatables. We’ll go 
right out now and lay in a supply,” said Jim. They went 
down the street to find a market. The city was a human 


72 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

hubbub of solitude to them. They had each other for com¬ 
pany and that was all. Thousands passed and repassed and 
brushed elbows with them, but they were alone; more alone, 
farther away from neighbors and companionship, than they 
were out on their own farms in the country. They looked at 
the window displays at their leisure and at their scurrying 
fellow mortals on the sidewalks who were seemingly all 
dressed in their Sunday clothes and all hastening to some 
important affair at the other end of their journey. Every¬ 
body had a business air except themselves; they were the 
only idlers in the city from the appearance of things. 

“ Let’s go in here and prospect in the eating line. It looks 
good to me,” said Jim after they had bought some groceries 
which they carried with them. The place was a large res¬ 
taurant with the front windows filled with bakery products. 
A young woman, once very young probably and now trying to 
appear less than thirty, in white cap and apron, was making 
pancakes and waffles in part of the window. “These people 
must be pancake nutty,” said Jim. “They evidently eat 
their breakfast the night before so as to have a good start 
in the morning. Let’s go away back yonder and sit at those 
tables and look the mob over while we eat a lunch.” They 
took seats at a little table at the far end of the room and Jim 
gave an order to the waitress. 

It was a popular restaurant. The multitude of patrons 
were clerks, business men, stenographers, men and women of 
the office working class principally, evidently with not over¬ 
large but still linen-collared incomes. It was a lunch house 
of large capacity and suited to either a limited purse or one 
better filled. They watched with interest the fast-changing 
and busy throng, each table seemingly centered on its own 
affairs and not taking any notice of their neighbors. Two 
girls came to their corner and took seats with their backs to 
them at a little table near by. 

They were smartly dressed, fur on their cloaks, short 
skirts and stockings to harmonize with their skirts and high- 
laced, high-heeled shoes. Mary noted at once that their 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 73 

lace collars were not as strictly fresh as the rest of their 
clothes, and looked as if they had been laundered the last 
time without soap or ironing. Both Mary and Jim noticed 
there was something of wanness and peakedness in their 
young faces. “Gee, Dot, I’m hungry,” said one of them 
wearily. “How much can we spend here and still sleep 
and have our regular ten-cent breakfast?” “Let’s see,” said 
Dot, the treasurer. “There’s ten, twenty, thirty, forty cents. 
We have a dollar and ten cents left. We can get a bed for two 
for six bits. That’ll be an inside room with a transom for a 
ventilator; opening into the hall along with twenty other inside 
transoms and the porter sweeping the hall dust through 
in the morning, but it’ll be a bed and a roof over us. Break¬ 
fast will be ten cents each and that’ll be ninety-five cents 
gone and we’ll have just fifteen cents. How’re we going to 
do it, Mamie?” The voice had taken on a tone of dismay. 
“Let’s order two pretzels. We get them for fifteen cents and 
we can drink water. I think there is more good eating in them 
than anything else we can order for ten cents, or we can order 
bread and butter for ten cents and one cup of coffee without 
milk or sugar and then divide the coffee between us. I can 
pretend I don’t want coffee anyway.” 

“Gee,” said Dot wearily, “I’d like a big platter filled with a 
thick slice of ham in the center, luscious ham like that we got 
out in the country, and six eggs ranged round the platter as 
sentinel guards for the ham to see it didn’t get away. I 
could eat the whole thing right now without stopping for 
breath. We must get work to-morrow, Mamie. Must is 
the word. I believe I’m going to get on in the big shipping 
office, but I don’t see how I’m going to get through the first 
forenoon if I do get the job. I’m as weak as a cat; yes, I’m 
weaker. I’m as weak as a wobbly kitten.” 

“Jim,” whispered Mary as she took out a five-dollar bill 
from her purse and slipped it to him with an appealing look. 
He had been listening and her action woke him up as to what 
he should do. The two girls were startled out of their physi¬ 
cal weakness by a deep baritone voice close to their ears: 


74 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

“ All right, girls; we’ve been eavesdropping and we know just 
how your bank account stands. You’re going to be guests 
of ours at supper and breakfast, anyway. So turn around 
and join us.” The girls had looked round in a half-frightened 
way at the first sound of the strange voice but the big stranger 
was so pleasant looking yet so emphatic in his low tones that 
were gauged for their ears alone and Mary’s face was so as¬ 
suring that their surprise disappeared and a flush succeeded 
the pallor. 

“Now get up for a minute,” said Jim, rising, “and I’ll shove 
your little table over here beside ours and we’ll make it a 
family party of four and I’ll do the ordering for all. You see, 
I’m the elephant of the group and I’ll order an elephant’s 
share for each one. I’ll measure your appetite by my own 
when I’m hungry. Waiter, come here. We want in addi¬ 
tion to what I ordered two bowls of this clam chowder and 
two teabone steaks, with eggs on the side with each steak. 
Let us have the best steaks you have and potatoes and string 
beans and apple pie, all for two, and two coffees. Give me 
the check for all.” The waitress seemed to size up the situa¬ 
tion and nodded approvingly as much as to say: “I’ll do my 
best.” 

“Here, girls,” Mary said, as she emptied out a glass of 
water and poured half her cup of coffee in it and gave each a 
half cup, “you put cream and sugar in this to suit yourselves 
and sip it hot while you wait. A little hot coffee tones us up 
for eating and I’m not coffee hungry, in fact, I didn’t want it.” 
Tears came into the eyes of both girls and Dot looked for an 
instant as if she were going to collapse. These strangers 
seemed to read their minds. A drink of that coffee, the 
aroma of which had come across the table, was just what each 
craved. The first spoonful was nectar of the gods and as they 
sipped they reacted physically and mentally to the stimu¬ 
lant. In their more than half-starved condition the strong 
coffee acted as an intoxicant. It went to their heads. Their 
eyes brightened and glistened and their brains responded to 
the invitation and they started to talk and say the things that 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 75 

just naturally overflowed. Their hosts seemingly paid no 
attention to them although they were keenly observant 
and noted the effect as the girls babbled on. 

“ We’re strangers in town,” said Mary. “I’m glad we met 
you, for you can tell us something about the city. We don’t 
know one street from the other. We’re from the country 
and don’t know much about cities, anyway.” 

“We’re almost strangers, here, too,” said Dot. “We came 
from a little country town in Wisconsin. We went to busi¬ 
ness college there and learned stenography and struck out for 
the great West; but I guess we made a mistake to leave 
home.” Her tone was very rueful. 

“Yes,” said Mamie, “we find stenographers here are thicker 
than flies in summertime. At least our class of stenographers 
are. You see we’re only the ordinary business college girl 
graduate and we find we can only do the commonest kind of 
office copying. We can’t hold a position in any responsible 
capacity, for we don’t know anything in any kind of work as a 
specialty. We’re of the class that’s out of work if any 
stenographers are.” 

“I had a place for a day last week,” broke in Dot, “but 
I was fired because the manager said I spelled ‘horse’ with an 
‘a’ in it, spelled it ‘hoarse.’ I don’t think office managers 
appreciate us business college girls; at least not as working, 
dependable office stenographers. We’ve only had a few days’ 
work since we’ve been here and it’s weary work tramping 
round from office to office or sitting in employment offices 
waiting for the job that never comes to us but does come to 
someone else who knows how to do some one thing. Ex¬ 
penses are fearfully high when you’re out of work.” 

“Did you try any other line?” asked Mary. “I hear 
there’s a great demand for household help.” 

“We know there is such a demand,” said Dot, “but we 
wanted office work where we could have a regular salary and 
regular hours and wear office clothes, go to work at eight in 
the morning and quit at five in the evening and have the 
rest of the time to ourselves. We wanted the sociability of 


76 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

the office; to mingle with the other girls and also the other 
boys, and go to parties and dances in the evening. I guess 
one of us business college girls thinks more of that than we do 
of money. A starved heart makes a person pretty discon¬ 
tented; at least it does one of us girls. We would make al¬ 
most any sort of a sacrifice for our society fling. We want to 
mix with the throng and be where the other girls and fellows 
are. I guess we’re a curious makeup and if we could only 
stand off and take a look at ourselves we might be different, 
but we can’t do that and so we just go along and let our in¬ 
tuitions be our masters and they sometimes run our boat on 
the rocks.” 

“I can do housework first class,” said Mamie. “Mama 
was the prize housekeeper in our part of the country and we 
girls just had to learn. I’d like to keep house if I had one of 
my own, and when I get able I’m going to quit rooming and 
get an apartment and keep it as cosy as a model. I can 
bake and cook and wash dishes and make pies and do any¬ 
thing round the kitchen but I hate to work for other women. 
I tried it and nearly every woman who has a hired girl is 
bossy and inconsiderate and wants you to sleep in the garret 
and live like a hermit in the kitchen. No dances, no socia¬ 
bility except flirtation on the sly with the delivery man, and 
that’s a poor imitation of the kind of flirtation we girls hanker 
after. Half the ads you see in the paper where capable 
women want work says: ‘No woman boss,’ and these women 
know why they write an advertisement that way. A shop 
girl or one of these waitresses has a better life than the 
average house girl.” 

“We like office work because we can get along far better 
with a man boss than a woman boss,” said Dot. “We’ll 
stand more bossing from a man, too, than from a woman 
because we know that he generally knows his business and I 
guess men are natural bosses anyway. They’ve got the 
habit, at any rate. Now if a woman had fired me because I 
spelled ‘horse’ with an ‘a’ in the middle of it I’d probably 
have called her an old hen or a mean old thing when I got 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 77 

away but when Mr. Gordon told me gently to get out I said 
all right, quite resignedly, and went.” 

“I believe it is a fact,” said Mamie, “that we like to be 
puttering around where the real men are doing things and 
letting us help do them even if we weren’t going to do the 
same things in the next million years. When we’re in an 
office we’ve a chance to be near some real man while we’re 
earning bread and butter and I guess it’s instinct but we 
can’t ever marry a real man unless we get a chance to be round 
where he is and no real man could marry us unless he gets a 
chance to be round where we are. After all, the marrying 
business that we’re all headed for is mostly from being close 
together. I’ve noticed most any kind of a girl can marry a 
man if she’s close to him long enough and there’s not too 
much competition. I’m not talking about the Johnnies of 
the dance halls but about the men who don’t have time or 
inclination to be a dance-hall Johnny and who can’t do any¬ 
thing more difficult than a two-step and can’t do that so 
awfully graceful.” 

“I haven’t had much experience,” said Mary, “but don’t 
you think that the real man you speak of wants a cook and 
housekeeper much more than he does a stenographer?” 

“I know you’re right,” said Mamie, “but the stenographer 
has a chance to meet him ten times to the cook’s once. You 
see,” she said haltingly, as if it were beginning to dawn on 
her mind that she had taken her hosts too much into her 
confidence, “I’m thinking about these things a whole lot I 
suppose, or rather I know them without doing any thinking, 
but when we’re in our right mind we don’t talk about them 
much to strangers as we’ve been doing to you. I guess Dot 
and I are both a little flighty here to-night and inclined to 
be garrulous, but we’ll be in our right minds, I guess, after 
we have had our supper. My head doesn’t feel as light as it 
did before I began on this soup. How’s yours, Dot?” she 
asked as everybody laughed at the na'ive confession. 

“Mine’s getting back to normal,” said Dot. “I guess we 
were doing that stunt that the lady school teacher was try- 


78 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

ing to explain to us on Sunday. What did she call it? Psy¬ 
choanalysis or something like that. At any rate, it’s where a 
patient, always a woman, of course, tells all her fool con¬ 
fidences to a man doctor and is immediately cured of what¬ 
ever ails her. I guess that’s what we’ve been doing: telling 
our friends here all about ourselves till they know us better 
than we know ourselves.” 

“You can excuse me from the class that has that expert 
curing knowledge,” said Jim, smiling. “You’re more com¬ 
plicated to me than a Chinese puzzle.” 

“I’m awful glad of it,” said Mamie, as the good humor 
became contagious. “We don’t know ourselves, at least 
we’re not at all sure we do, and a mere man can’t expect to 
understand us. If he did I guess we wouldn’t be interesting 
to him any longer and then we had better be dead. That’s 
about all that keeps us alive, anyway.” 

“Well, seriously, girls,” said Mary, “don’t you think 
you’re on the wrong track? You can cook and keep house 
and be useful in a womanly way in womanly work. Why 
not do that if you can do it well and get away from the 
drudgery where you’ll always be underpaid and looked on as 
a menial? I think good housekeeping is woman’s best work 
anyway and if she’s in her own home there’s no higher 
position for her; and if she’s not in her own home she can be 
learning and doing the next best thing to taking care of her 
own home. As for social opportunities, they can be made 
by any one if they don’t come of themselves. If I were you 
I’d go away right now before it’s too late and begin doing 
a real woman’s work instead of being an incompetent clerk 
coming and going at the nod of some stranger boss.” 

“Well,” said Mamie thoughtfully, “I believe the average 
girl in the city would rather work for any old tyrannical man 
in an office or even in one of these city restaurants or any 
other kind of work than for a woman in her home even if she 
tried to be good to her help. It isn’t so in the country. 
Out there I know girls don’t dislike to work for the women 
and they can get along fine with the country woman as a 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 79 

boss, but in the city deliver me from the lady overseer. 
However, I’ve about made up my mind that Dot and I are 
on the wrong track and that we should start in and do the 
things we can do and never mind whether we have a woman 
boss or a man boss and get where we can be independent of 
any boss.” 

“I feel that way, too,” said Dot, “since this clam chowder 
came. Let’s go out to that big house on Queen Anne Hill 
in the morning and go to work. You be first girl and I’ll be 
helper. We’ll do housework till you get a chance in the 
kitchen and later I’ll get in there, too, and learn, and when 
we get money enough and some experience we’ll start in busi¬ 
ness here downtown in some capacity. I know we can do it.” 

“ I believe so, too,” said Mamie. “ Besides, I don’t like the 
way we’re going on. We’re getting hardened, it seems to me. 
I hear us saying things in a way that Mama would have 
called us down for and I believe we’re getting to the point 
Professor Dodson used to refer to as sophisticated. Let’s 
quit this wandering about and get back to home life even if it 
isn’t so gay. I will if you will.” 

“I’ll do it,” said Dot. “What we need is a home or some 
place we can go to as home. I know we can make more 
money as good housekeepers than as poor stenographers and 
perhaps after all the fellow with the black curls who dances 
all the latest steps isn’t the one we’re looking for, and per¬ 
haps if we’re good housekeepers we may be the one he is 
looking for if he ever gets either much sense or money. I am 
beginning to believe that business-college stenography and 
dance-hall society and lunch-counter starvation are poor com¬ 
pensation for the sacrifice of the home life to a girl out in 
the world all alone. Let’s reform right now before it’s too 
late.” 

“And after all, I think the lady up on the hill is rather nice,” 
said Mamie. “And even if she is somewhat cranky, perhaps 
we are, too. It’s so easy to think the boss woman is a crank 
and never look at ourselves. Let’s go there first thing in the 
morning. I’ll call her up now.” 


8o 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

In five minutes she returned to the table. “It’s all right. 
We go to work in the morning. We have to thank you folks 
for this, and I feel so much better that I can’t express it. 
I’m cured of stenographitis or officitis or whatever you like to 
call it. No more for me.” 

“We’ll leave you girls here to finish your supper,” said 
Jim, rising. “I will leave with you the amount of your bill 
so that there will be no mixup as there would be if I pay it 
at the counter now. I’ll also give you this five-dollar bill. 
You can return it to me at the address I write on this paper 
if you ever get rich. You needn’t be in any hurry. Write 
and tell us how you make out.” He and Mary walked away 
before the girls had time to thank them. 

They went ahead with their purchasing of groceries, which 
was the beginning of their three weeks’ trip along the coast 
during which time they went as far as California. They went 
to theatres and churches and excursions and mixed and 
mingled with people of all the different kinds and castes of de¬ 
cent American life and got enjoyment out of it all. The holi¬ 
day spirit ruled every hour till they returned and walked 
into their own home. 


CHAPTER VI 


T HE days began to take on routine regularity, the 
hours filled with work for both Jim and Mary. They 
had to rise early, for the horses, cows and chickens and 
hogs did not dress up in shiny clothes as soon as darkness 
came and gallivant around in social visits with their neigh¬ 
bors and dance and sing until midnight or after, and then roll 
into bed to sleep until the sun was strong and hot in the fore¬ 
noon. They quit feeding at dark, and by the time it was 
really dark they were all quiet and composed for the night. 
To them the night was the time for rest and sleep and it 
commenced at dark and ended with daybreak. From nine 
o’clock until an hour after midnight, when foolish men and 
women were widest awake of all their waking hours, these 
animal friends of Jim and Mary got their chief rest and sleep 
refreshment and at daylight they were as wide awake as the 
morning sun that came up with its broad and inquiring look 
over the dew-covered fields and shone into the recesses of the 
woods and openings of the barns and stables. When they 
could get out they were revelling over the damp grass in the 
glorious clear morning air that had nothing of the dust, 
smoke, or grime that the bustle of civilization fills it with in 
the cities later on in the day, and if they could not get out 
they met Jim with a friendly questioning look of big liquid 
eyes that looked across the mangers in anxious but patient 
query as if saying, “Why so late this morning, our master?” 
or met him at the entrance to the hog-lot with grunts of 
greeting. And Mary’s very numerous friends of the yards 
and fields were just as insistent on their early morning rec¬ 
ognition, and clucked and gabbled and swarmed around her 
in eager anticipation. The sunup hour each day was an ex- 

81 


82 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

act repetition of the same hour the day before and all the 
days of the year, and it never grew old or stale or wearisome. 
No matter how sleepy Jim and Mary might be coming out 
of the house, the first greeting of the wide-awake friends in the 
yards and stables wakened them and started the day with 
pleasurable enthusiasm. The mute, wide-awake, appealing 
look of the cows and horses and sheep and the noisy demon¬ 
stration of the chickens were as inspiring and as soul gratify¬ 
ing the last day of the month as they had been the first; 
and an hour among the farm animals always threw a many- 
hued rainbow of promise on the horizon of what was sure to 
be a usefully spent and busy day in the fields and house¬ 
hold. 

One evening after one of these work days, when the hours 
had flown on wings so swift that neither Jim nor Mary had 
remembrance of the passing of the day, they were in the kit¬ 
chen after supper as usual. They had no need for a dining 
room or a sitting room or a parlor or a best room of any kind. 
Mary’s big kitchen was like the German hausfrau’s in the 
olden days, her particular pride and care. It was a big room. 
The little city kitchenette with only space enough for one 
person to be in it at a time and a place where each of the 
small utensils must be kept at all times in order to conserve 
the little space available was not for her. She had a big 
expansive range that meant a hot, long continued heat 
when it was set going, a broadly distributed heat that would 
cook a multitudinous dinner when necessary. She had a big 
expansive white-enameled sink with big, strong, powerful, 
silver-polished faucets that would fill pans or pails or kettles 
with rushing hot or cold water without delay. In the centre 
of the big room was an expansive work table. Built up in 
the centre of this table was a three-decked stand, fifteen 
inches wide, that divided the big table into two tables and 
provided a place for setting all the utensils in use, in prepara¬ 
tion, or completed cookery. There was a kitchen cabinet, a 
smaller corner table, and a couple of chairs; nothing extra or 
superfluous to clutter up the floor space. The woodwork and 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 83 

tables were scrubbed and polished to a degree of cleanest 
cleanliness. The utensils and white-enameled sink and big 
range were shining; the little table was covered with a linen 
tablecloth and set with the chinaware and silver that Mary 
had received from her mother; enough plates and knives and 
forks and spoons and dishes for her and Jim where they ate 
their breakfast and supper and dinner, for Jim would have 
none of going into some other room to eat. Mary’s kitchen 
was the joy of her life, and Jim was proud of it and would live 
nowhere else, so they made it their real home. He watched 
her cook and helped her in the rough work, and the kitchen 
was the cave-man’s cave over again, only modified and im¬ 
proved and refined by the evolution of the ages. 

“ Come on, let’s go down along the water front this evening 
as far as the Clark ranch,” said Jim. “I want to talk with 
Mr. Clark about some of that blooded stock of his.” 

“All right,” said Mary, “I will be ready in five minutes,” 
and she flew around and straightened up the kitchen. In a 
short time they were bowling along the road south and west 
and turned along the water front. The week’s work had just 
been finished, and the mills and industries that employed a 
host of workers had turned off their power. Most of them 
were still throwing off jets of steam, but it was the clearing- 
up work for the engineers and firemen before they quit for the 
week-end. The population along the route was nearly all 
foreign, living in clusters and little villages, talking in strange 
tongues. They were earning good wages, were well dressed, 
their clothes were clean, their houses tidy. The boys and 
girls of school age were already posing as young Americans. 
The older boys and girls were adopting American ways and 
clothes. Their week’s work done, they had blossomed out, 
and silk shirts and shirt-waists were here and there to be seen 
among the more common Sunday clothes. The old folks, too, 
from the peasant villages of Europe were perking up and try¬ 
ing to live somewhat in an American way. A little blond¬ 
haired, blue-eyed, fat-cheeked fellow, six years old, and a 
black-haired, black-eyed, Hebrew-faced boy, of the same age, 


8 4 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

were settling a difference with much talk and doubled-up 
fists as Jim and Mary passed. 

“You’re a Swede,” said the black-eyed boy. 

“I ain’t a Swede,” angrily denied the fair-haired one, “I’m 
an American. Dad took out his papers last week. You 9 re 
not an American; you’re a Sheeney.” 

“I ain’t a Sheeney, either. I’m an American,” shouted the 
dark boy. “My father works for the Judge, and nobody but 
an American can work for the Judge. He is going to get all 
his American papers next year and Sis goes to the high school 
and learns American there; I tell you we are all Americans.” 

“It seems to be in the air,” said Jim. “All these thousands 
seem to have caught it. They are dropping their old-world 
ways.” 

“But I don’t see them at church,” said Mary. 

“No, the Catholic Church holds her people. It provides 
instruction in their own language, whatever that language 
may be, and it loses very few members among these foreigners, 
but the majority are drifting; just drifting, religiously, and the 
worst of it is they are drifting out to sea. Many of them are 
already out of sight of land or warning lighthouse.” 

“I wish we could do something to get them into our 
church,” said Mary. “We must try, Jim. It’s all right to 
send our missionaries abroad, but we can do missionary work 
ourselves right here if we are willing. How nice it would be 
if all these thousands were getting ready for Sunday-school 
and church to-morrow. Let’s do something, Jim; let’s pray 
specially for help and guidance to bring these people to Christ 
to-night when we get home, and I know we will find a way to 
reach them, or at least some of them. Suppose it is only a 
dozen or a half a dozen. I know we can do it, Jim. Let’s get 
half a dozen real Christians out of all these villages. I know 
we can do that much, and perhaps a great many more.” 

“All right, little girl,” said Jim, stopping in the road and 
putting his arm around her and drawing her up close to him, 
“we’ll pray for God’s grace and work ourselves and we’ll win 
more than one soul from this great mixed throng. Let’s be- 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 85 

gin praying now,” and although directly in front of a houseful 
of people who looked on in silent wonderment they bowed 
their heads together while Jim prayed to God earnestly for an 
outpouring of His spiritual power and grace that they might 
save souls here for Christ. “There, I feel surer now,” he said 
as they resumed their journey. “I see good work ahead for 
us and now we must find the ways and means to do it.” 

“I know we’ll get help and guidance,” said Mary, “ifwe’re 
as zealous as the apostles were, and I know a way of reaching 
these people will be opened up.” 

Supper was over and the dishes washed and the work done. 
Jim had pulled a rocking chair in from the parlor, pulled on 
his slippers, and was reading the daily paper. Mary came 
around and took the place where she delighted most to be 
when she had anything of an especial nature to say to Jim. 
She seated herself on the rail of the rocker with her arm around 
Jim’s neck and her cheek close to his. 

“There, now,” she said, putting her hand over the column 
where he was reading, “ I want to talk with you. I am think¬ 
ing about how to reach all these people down on the water 
front.” 

“Well, I see the minister coming in at the gate. We’ll talk 
it over with him, and if we can find something real to do that 
will have results, we’ll get in and do it. Come in, Mr. Story,” 
he called out. “You need never wait to knock at our door.” 

“That’s good, I’ll be one of the family, then,” said Reverend 
Story, opening the door and extending his hand to both Jim 
and Mary. 

“You just came in time. Mary has been worrying to death 
over a problem that came to us. We have been looking 
through the foreign mill-hand villages below, and she thinks 
we should make an eflfort to reach these people in our church 
work. I think so, too, but how, is the question. We have 
no real practical solution of how to reach any big body of 
them quickly. I just told her we would talk it over with 
you.” 


86 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

“Good,” said the minister. “We have all been thinking 
along the same lines. I intended to bring this very subject up 
some time among the members. We have our Sunday-school 
and our prayer meetings and other strictly church affairs, but 
I doubt if we are reaching out into the lives of all our people 
who are outside the church as we might do. If our commun¬ 
ity work could be extended in different directions, we might 
use influences for the general good that are not utilized now. 
For example, if we had an Americanization school attached to 
our church work and auxiliary to it, we might be doing some¬ 
thing very beneficial in the line of good citizenship propa¬ 
ganda. Now what do you think?” 

“Fine,” said Jim. “The very thing. There’s an un¬ 
limited field. There is a little army of foreigners within 
reach and I know they are anxious and willing to learn to be 
Americans. They are clannish because they have to be. 
They can’t help it. They don’t know our language, laws, or 
customs, and their associations are all among themselves. 
And some of our Americans might possibly absorb some 
American knowledge to advantage.” 

“You have my idea exactly,” said Reverend Story. “Now 
how will we go about it?” 

“Why not begin at the beginning and organize a school;just 
a real teaching school for grown-ups; teach them the English 
language and the common school book knowledge, and Ameri¬ 
can history, and Americanism generally as auxiliary school 
work,” said Mary. “I know all the people from Poland along 
the water front are trying their best to pick up enough Eng¬ 
lish so they can mix with Americans, and I believe they will all 
join in with enthusiasm.” 

“That’s a good idea,” said the minister. “Now, who can 
we get to take charge of such a school? Will you do that? 
I am sure you can make a success of it, and it is the very thing 
we need. I had another idea, but yours is better; in fact, 
yours is the only idea. Will you manage the school? You 
can have the hall, or I am sure you can have the school build¬ 
ing.” 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 87 

“I don’t feel competent; perhaps Jim would manage it,” 
said Mary, as she looked doubtfully at her husband. 

“No, you’re it,” said Jim. “Just before you came in, Mr. 
Story, Mary was suggesting that we take more part in neigh¬ 
borhood betterment work, and here is the chance. Mary is 
unanimously elected boss of the new school; all in favor of 
that will say, ‘Aye!’” There were two loud “Ayes!” “It’s 
unanimous. You’re elected, Mary. We will all go to your 
school and will never be absent or tardy.” 

“Well, I accept,” said Mary, joining in the laugh. “I’ll get 
out my rod and ferule and start in, but how? I don’t see my 
way clear at all. I’m afraid it is too big a job.” 

“I’ll leave all the details to you,” said the minister, rising. 
“You have taken a load off my mind. Whatever you want 
me to do, let me know. I’ll be a willing conscript. Good¬ 
night and good luck.” 

“Now, Jim, you got me into this responsibility and you will 
have to put your brain to work and show me the way out,” 
said Mary as she resumed her place on the rail of the arm¬ 
chair. 

“Well,’' 7 said Jim, “the first thing is to advertise. If you 
are going to have a school you must have scholars. I’ll have 
bills run off and put them up all around telling about the 
school. Where can it be held?” 

“The hall is bigger, with more room for the crowd, but the 
school rooms are all fitted up, and one big crowd can be 
divided up and we can have as many teachers as we want. 
I’ll see Carrie Ganz and Louise Hanson in the morning, I 
know they will help, and they’re experienced teachers, so 
that we are not so badly off for a beginning. You’ll help, 
too, Jim.” 

“No, I’ll loaf around on the outside. What’s the matter 
with making this a strictly woman’s job; the new woman 
saving the country. If I don’t mistake the teachers will 
learn a great deal more than the scholars.” 

*Why, I can’t teach a lot of ignorant foreigners who don’t 
even know our language, anything about Americanism,” said 


88 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

Mary, with an anxious note in her voice. “I don’t know any¬ 
thing about our form of government or how it’s run or who 
runs it. How on earth am I to explain the American 
constitution to these people? I can’t even talk to them 
intelligently when I don’t know anything about the practical 
workings of the constitution myself. I remember I got ninety- 
eight per cent, in our graduation examination in civics. I 
could rattle off the book-learning about the constitution and 
Carrie Price and I were the star constitutioners of the class; 
real statesmen prodigies because we diagrammed the con¬ 
stitution on the blackboard. You know our text-book had 
it all diagrammed out on the last two pages like the genealogi¬ 
cal tree of a French king tracing his ancestors back to the 
dim ages. We learned that diagram by heart and put it on 
the blackboard while all the school looked on and wondered. 
We could begin with the executive, judicial, and legislative 
heads and fill all the blackboards in the school with diagrams 
showing how all the governmental powers down to the elec¬ 
tion of the town constable were connected with the fountain 
heads at Washington, D. C., and yet neither of us could ex¬ 
plain how the town constable or the town council was elected, 
or how the money was raised to pay for the new bridge across 
the river. We knew all about the book theory of the Ameri¬ 
can government but didn’t know what a caucus was or how to 
make a motion in a public meeting, or how congress actually 
did its daily work. I guess civics education in a girl’s college 
class has about as much connection with real political Ameri¬ 
can life as Pharaoh’s mummy has with Edison’s laboratory. 
I am awfully ignorant and I prophesy I am going to find it 
out right away.” 

“That’s a lugubrious way of looking at it,” laughed Jim. 
“I fancy your other teachers will be as ignorant as you are, 
too. However, the tragedy isn’t so tragic when you get a 
close-up and see all the features. Now let’s take one step at 
a time, and see where we are at. You don’t jump to the top 
of Mt. Tacoma. You start off at the bottom at the level and 
walk almost on the level on a pleasant roadway through plea- 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 89 

sant wooded dales. You begin to rise gradually and wind 
around and keep winding and rising till at last you come out 
right at the top above timber line in the snow, and you look 
down and see how you curved around and rose up to get 
there.” 

“That’s all right, but I have to know a terrific bunch of 
real knowledge before I can teach Americanism, and I am 
not competent and I know that thoroughly.” 

“Well, little girl, let’s look at the field. You can’t begin 
to teach constitutional history to these foreigners the first 
day; you can’t show them how the constitution is amended or 
how an appeal is carried up to the supreme court from our 
superior court, and you don’t have to. They can’t talk 
English. They don’t understand the English lingo. They 
don’t grasp ideas in English because they can’t think in 
English. We never know Spanish or German till we can 
think in Spanish or German. There’s the difficulty in learn¬ 
ing a foreign language. We have to learn to think in the 
foreign tongue. If we can’t do that we can’t talk it or write it 
or understand it. That’s the first problem with these people. 
They must learn English, that is, learn to think in English. 
Most of them have bright intellects. ‘Ignorant foreigners’ 
is an easy expression for us and we use it, but what is ignor¬ 
ance? You remember Pilate said: ‘What is truth?’ And his 
question hasn’t yet been answered, not in 2000 years. What 
is ignorance is about as hard to answer. At any rate the 
ignorant Jewish children in New York far outstrip the native 
Americans, and I shouldn’t be surprised if some of these 
ignorant kids down on the water front would astonish you 
with their grasp of fundamentals.” 

“Well, how will we begin? I don’t see my way.” 

“You begin just like you begun to walk up Mt. Tacoma. 
You don’t begin at the top. Your scholars gather at the 
school house. They are all grown-ups and it is seven thirty 
p.m. The school is lighted and heated. They are of all 
nationalities and all ages. There are bright boys and girls of 
sixteen, eighteen, and twenty; young men and women, twenty 


90 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

to thirty, single and married, mostly married, for the foreign¬ 
er from Europe marries early; there are older men and 
women, mostly men, from thirty to forty-five and still older 
men up to seventy. All of them are hungering and thirsting 
for American knowledge, eager, wonderfully eager, to learn, 
willing to be obedient, and industrious to the limit, confident 
that you and your girl pals can make Americans of them. 
Their clothes are all clean and their eyes are bright, and none 
of them were ever sick a day in their lives. There’s where 
they have the better of us Americans. 

“Now, some of them can speak fairly good English, some 
not so good English, some pidgin English, and some no Eng¬ 
lish beyond saying ‘good morning’ and ‘sure’ and stock- 
slang they have picked up. Some of them are well read in 
their own language and other European languages, for your 
central European is a natural linguist, and if you give these 
people a good chance they’ll pick up English, even its intricate 
idioms, in a surprisingly short time. Their natural linguistic 
heredity will make it easier for you. They have the language 
instinct born in them. Most of them can understand two or 
more languages already. Some of them will be well read in 
the history of their native country, and perhaps history of 
the world and its peoples generally in the broad sense. Some 
of them will know only their own local folk-lore. Some of 
them will be masters of ordinary mathematics and know some 
grammar and geography, but the majority will not. Some 
will not be able to count over one hundred or read or write 
any language. You will have all ages and all degrees of edu¬ 
cation. 

“The first thing to do is to lick them into some sort of a 
school organization, divide them into classes so you can teach 
groups. That will require tact, for these people are sensitive 
and clannish. Their environment makes them clannish. 
Individual instruction will be much more of a necessity than 
in the ordinary school you will find as you go along. When 
you get them into classes, you will begin teaching the ordina¬ 
ry English subjects as taught in the ordinary English school. 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 91 

Teach them to read and write and cipher, teach geography 
and some history and no grammar except that which comes 
through ordinary instruction in the use of English. Grammar 
is a subject for very advanced grades only. These people 
must be taught practically, without much theory. To teach 
them you teachers will have to be able to realize their level of 
knowledge and that is the one natural gift that distinguishes 
the true teacher anywhere in the world from the theoretical 
make-believe teacher. Before you can instruct one of these 
classes you must be able to get down mentally to where they 
are, realize what they know, and what they don’t know, real¬ 
ize what difficulties must be clambered over in arithmetic and 
other branches by scholars on their particular plane of knowl¬ 
edge and mental calibre. Any of your teachers who can do 
that will succeed. Any who cannot do so, who haven’t the 
natural gift of locating the knowledge plane of the class, will 
fail. They can’t help failing, and they can’t acquire the art 
of knowing this one requisite in the real teacher. They must 
have it within themselves as part of their own mental, moral, 
and intellectual equipment. It’s a gift God bestows on the 
true teacher; and the make-believe, the unsuccessful teacher, 
never has it nor can she learn it from any outside source. 
Pestalozzi and Montessori had this gift and that’s why they 
created kindergarten teaching. You will have kindergarten 
work to do for these people are children in our ways, but they 
will soon graduate from the kindergarten class and then will be 
time enough to do higher-up work. The fir'st thing and the 
hardest thing to do is to divide them into classes. After that’s 
done the rest of the program will follow automatically. Now, 
I am some oracle, am I not, or rather ain’t I?” 

“You are, indeed. At any rate, I can now see daylight 
through the maze and while we are doing the kindergarten 
work we can be outlining the real Americanization program. 
I should think we would need two other teachers.” 

“Yes, and you will have to pay Miss Carrie Ganz and Miss 
Louise Hanson. Teaching is their daily occupation and we 
can’t expect them to do extra work at night as volunteers. 


92 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

We can get volunteers from the church membership without 
pay. The scholars will be willing to pay a small fee to remu¬ 
nerate these two experienced teachers. Now get a pencil and 
we will draw up a bill to have printed and distributed to¬ 
morrow.” 

“All right,” said Mary, resting herself on Jim’s knee with 
pencil and tablet in hand, “what shall we say in this dodger?” 

“What do you suggest?” said Jim. 

“Why, I think we should advertise it as a night school to 
instruct in the English branches; or suppose we make it 
plainer by running the words ‘Night School’ in big letters at 
the top and another smaller type line ‘Foreign-born people 
taught English.’ Then in a paragraph below in good-sized 
type say something like this: ‘A night school for grown-up 
foreign-born people will begin in the school house at Albright 
Monday evening, June twenty-seventh, at eight o’clock. 
Reading, writing, arithmetic, geography, history, and 
American ways of government will be taught. There will be 
classes for the old and young; men and women, who do not 
know how to speak English but want to learn to speak and 
read and write and classes for all those who want more ad¬ 
vanced instruction in American knowledge. Everybody in¬ 
vited to come and join. A small fee of twenty-five cents per 
week will be charged to pay expenses. Old men and women, 
middle-aged men and women, and young men and women 
who are not going to school now are invited to come and will 
be made welcome. Boys and girls now attending school are 
not admitted except as interpreters.’ I’ll ask Carrie Ganz to 
pick out a dozen of her brightest pupils to interpret for us.” 

“Fine,” said Jim, “you’ve got my idea exactly.” 

“Do you know, Jim, I believe that we can get many of 
these people into the church if we can get them started this 
way in this school.” 


CHAPTER VII 


M ONDAY evening came. Jim had done his work well. 
His blue-and-red dodgers had been distributed thor¬ 
oughly, the school trustees had been seen and the 
janitor, and Mary had engaged the Misses Ganz and Hanson. 
Everyone connected with the venture was keyed up percep¬ 
tibly. There had been visible a certain public excitement 
that permeated the atmosphere generally. The schoolboys 
and girls along the water front had grabbed the bills and with 
much pride in their American knowledge had read them dra¬ 
matically to their folks. As the folks caught on they became 
intensely interested. The young people, as a matter of 
course, declared they were all going. The old folks were 
slower in acting, but as the scheme was explained over and 
over again and as the Poniatowskis and the Chernoffs and 
the Ehrensteins talked this subject over at the family tables 
and over the backyard fences, they unanimously agreed 
either openly or secretly each one by himself or herself or each 
couple by themselves, that they were going to be there at the 
school opening and were going to learn American things. 

Jim and Mary and everyone else were gratified at the sight 
of the big assemblage that poured into the school grounds. It 
was unexpected in its numbers. The boys and girls came 
first, and with the confidence born of their status as inter¬ 
preters poured into the school room. The young men and 
women were almost as confident. The older people came 
slower and were less aggressive in their claims. They stayed 
outside or took rear seats with some of their relatives. Gray¬ 
haired men and women were there in their clean suits and 
dresses, keen-eyed, alert, backwardly taking their places as 
visitors but really hoping to pick up some crumbs from this 

93 


94 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

American feast, if any crumbs from the tables fell in their 
vicinity. They were eager, respectful, and expectant. 

“I am more than gratified, I am thankful for the response 
to your well-directed efforts,” said the minister, who was pres¬ 
ent, to the little crowd of workers as they gathered early in 
the teachers’ room at the rear of the school. 

“I think we all are and can begin to see our responsibility 
already,” said Jim. “I suggest that you lead us in a short 
prayer service. We all need divine help for here is a great 
undertaking.” Without another word the little band knelt 
down while the minister prayed for the blessing of God and 
asked His help and guidance which was followed by a short, 
earnest prayer by Jim. 

“Men may scoff at prayer,” he said as they arose, “and 
may say it is meaningless and useless, but communion with 
God surely gives calm courage and a steadfast soul in any 
undertaking that has to do with the extension of His rule over 
the hearts of men.” 

“That is the experience of the ages,” said the minister. 
“Now what is your program? Is it the intention to open 
with short religious services?” 

“I advise against that,” said Jim. “A great many of these 
people are Roman Catholics, some are Jews, some are Pro¬ 
testants, some are no church. We have the King James 
translation of the Scriptures as our Bible; the Catholics have 
the same Scriptures practically but a different translation, 
the Douay Bible, which they recognize as their Bible; the 
Jews have altogether another collection of scriptural teach¬ 
ings for their Bible. Neither the Catholics nor the Jews 
proselyte among the Protestants. The Catholics do send out 
missionaries and teachers among the heathen but they do not 
make individual efforts to proselyte Protestants. At times 
they get Protestant students in their sisterhood schools and 
make Catholics out of them, but this is a free-will choice of 
the student after a long experience and is not based on a 
campaign of persuasion on the part of the Catholics. If we 
open this evening school with scripture reading and prayer or 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 95 

even the singing of one of our hymns, it may be suspicioned by 
the Catholics and Jews that we have gathered their people 
together for a secular educational object and then try to make 
converts of them; to influence them through our sectarian reli¬ 
gious exercises. It is true the Master commanded us to preach 
His word to all the world, and we will do this, but He didn’t 
mean that we should preach His word in a manner that would 
arouse distrust and ill-feeling among our neighbors. We can 
be bold as lions in standing up for our Christian principles and 
yet not do that which offends our friends. We must re¬ 
member that the peoples of the earth who recognize and rev¬ 
erence and worship God are our friends even if they have 
doctrinal teachings that we disagree with or even denounce. 
Our religious enemies are the atheists and those who recognize 
no God or Saviour. With them we have no bond of religious 
union and for them we have no religious respect. If they 
alone were to be considered I would say let us go ahead and 
read and pray and sing, but they are not the ones I consider. 
Now, as far as I am concerned, I would be perfectly willing 
with my somewhat limited knowledge of the Catholic trans¬ 
lation of the Scriptures, to have a chapter from the Douay 
Bible read alternately each evening with a chapter from our 
King James translation, but why borrow trouble? We can 
assert our right to preach the Master’s word to all men by 
inviting all these people to our regular church services where 
prayer and song and preaching cannot be any offence to either 
Catholic or Jew.” 

“I was in favor of opening the school with singing a hymn 
or two at least,” said the minister, “and had picked out a 
couple of hymns for this evening, but I recognize the logic of 
your reasons as given, Jim, and I coincide with you. What 
say the others present?” 

“I think we need some opening exercise in which all can 
participate to focus attention and stabilize the attendance, to 
sort of unionize the scattered membership,” said Mary. 
“How would it do to open with the singing of ‘My Country 
’Tis of Thee’ and close with something different but similar 


96 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

in its patriotic effect. I am in favor of a regular routine open¬ 
ing and closing for its disciplinary effect. ,, 

“I like Mary’s idea,” said Carrie Ganz. “We should have 
the singing of about two verses of 'America’ to start with 
because that would send them into the classrooms in the 
properly receptive frame of mind for absorbing American pre¬ 
sented knowledge and ways of thought. We could close by 
all gathering in the big room and joining unitedly in some 
short, definite, impressive object lesson like the flag exercise 
that would send them out into the cold air warmed by the 
enthusiasm and mass energy of the last minute.” 

Everybody nodded acquiescence, and the minister said, “I 
guess we are on the right track now. I think the solution pre¬ 
scribed by the girls is agreed on unanimously.” 

“It’s time to get to work,” said Mary. “Who will lead 
the singing and who will make the opening explanation about 
the classes?” 

“Jim will do both,” said the minister. “And he will also 
go out on the grounds and gather everyone into the big room. 
I see a large crowd of older people outside and we must get 
them in and hold every one of them in our school. I’ll go 
out by the gate myself and if you girls will act as a reception 
committee inside we will get started in good shape in five 
minutes. Now everyone to his or her post of duty. Miss 
Carrie will ring the school bell.” 

The younger element flocked in and seated themselves at 
the sound of the bell. They were familiar with the routine, 
but most of the older people had never been in such a school 
building before in their lives and they hung back, especially 
the men. Jim and the minister busied themselves in the 
yard directing the people in; Mary stood just inside the door, 
and the teachers attended to the seating aided by the dozen 
young interpreters who were busy as bees in their official capa¬ 
city. Jim had the trying position for the folks who couldn’t 
speak English were loath to go inside when it came to the 
last minute. He tried to explain to them, but that was too 
slow. They were getting away from him and starting down 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 97 

the road toward home in groups of twos and fours. He 
adopted the plan of seizing an arm of an elderly woman and 
her man and leading them up to the minister near the door 
and turning them over to him. In turn, the minister turned 
them over to Mary and they were kept moving till they were 
seated. As Jim had to be in a hurry to handle his part of the 
work at times his practical idea of leading an old couple was 
to more than half carry them across the yard as a burly police¬ 
man might do with a couple of ten-year-old children. With 
his hat off and his coat and vest open he would chase down 
the road with long strides and come back with a gray-haired 
woman firmly gripped by the arm with one big hand and her 
grizzled husband as firmly held on the other side, both of 
them forced on the run to keep up with their guide. At 
last he returned with the only remaining pair and took them 
inside himself. He went clear up to the platform with them, 
farther forward than they had ever been before in a building 
of that kind. 

A big American flag had been stretched over the centre 
of the blackboard in the front of the room and smaller flags 
were on the sides. Around the desk was an array of chil¬ 
dren’s flags fastened upright, and a very large flag was on 
either side of the room. This decorating had been the task 
of the school children and they had done their work so taste¬ 
fully that the big room looked patriotic. 

Jim wasted no time. He stepped to the front and asked 
the young interpreters all to group themselves around him. 
He then announced that they were now going to sing part of 
the great American song. “It is called: ‘America.’” He 
asked the interpreters to tell the same thing to their people in 
their native language. “Tell them we will all sing the great 
American song. It is called:‘America,’” he repeated. The 
interpreters did this in half-a-dozen different languages, 
seemingly vying with each other in the emphatic earnestness 
of their announcement. Jim raised his arms and everyone 
rose. He led off and everyone either sang out loud< or fol¬ 
lowed the tune in spirit. Most of the younger people knew 


98 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

part of the words and when memory failed they supplied 
words of their own and kept on singing. It was noticeable 
that the treble of the little group of interpreters never lost a 
syllable. They knew the words, all of them. It was also 
noticeable that there were some very fine and well-trained 
voices in the hall. 

“We will open all our meetings with this song,” said Jim, 
when they were seated. “We want everyone to learn it. 
And we will close all our meetings with the flag drill. To¬ 
night we will have only these boys and girls here do the flag 
drill when we close but after to-night at every meeting we 
want everybody to take part in the drill. Miss Ganz and the 
little folks here will show how it is done now and it will be 
done that way at the close to-night and every night.” The 
interpreters were more than willing and every gesture and tone 
that Jim used was followed by them and in turn they were 
watched with eager interest by the audience as they stretched 
out their childish hands and repeated in most precise unison 
his commands. 

“Now,” said Jim to the interpreters, “I will say one short 
sentence at a time and I want you to say exactly the same 
thing to your folks. Will you do that ?” “Yes, we will,” came 
came back in a chorus. Jim turned to the audience and said: 
“This is the first night of our school and we cannot do much 
work to-night.” The interpreters repeated this and it was 
plain by the nods of the audience that their people under¬ 
stood. “We are going to teach everybody to talk American,” 
continued Jim. This was repeated by the interpreters. 
“We are going to teach everybody to read and write Ameri¬ 
can,” said Jim. This also was repeated. “We want every¬ 
one who cannot talk American to come into the room to the 
right.” The interpreters announced this and then circulated 
among their folks and got those who could not speak English 
or who could only speak pidgin English started into the next 
room where Jim directed them to seats. 

“Now those who remain here,” said Jim, returning, “will 
be divided into classes for reading, writing, arithmetic, geog- 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 99 

raphy, and history. We can’t do much to-night, but next 
Monday night we will get to work. I am going to teach the 
people in the next room and the teachers here will tell you 
what they want done. For the first three evenings we may 
be mixed in our classes but a little later everyone will find 
their proper place. We ask everyone who comes here to help 
someone else. If you know more than someone else show 
them how. Explain to them, but make them think for them¬ 
selves. Don’t just do their work for them. Make them do 
it but show them the hard parts. Now I am going to my 
work in the next room.” Turning to Mary he said: “You 
must command here even while you request. Now come 
with me, all you interpreters,” and he left the room. 

Mary arose with something of a tremor as she saw Jim 
vanish through the side door. It all seemed so easy while he 
was manager but when she had to take charge herself it was 
entirely different. She had outlined her program, however, 
thoroughly beforehand and soon had a grip on the situation. 
She quickly learned the wisdom of Jim’s admonition to com¬ 
mand even while she was requesting in that room. “All 
those who have attended an American high school or any 
school in a foreign country above the public school grades 
will please stand up,” she said. About a dozen stood up. 
“We will want to use you young men and women for teach¬ 
ers later,” said Mary. “You can be very useful here while 
learning some things for yourselves. I ask you to step into 
room number two. Miss Ganz will go with you and will take 
your names and will spend this evening in finding out just 
what each one knows as far as book knowledge is concerned.” 
The advanced pupils moved out. 

“Now,” she continued, “those from the second aisle to the 
wall will go into room three and those from the fourth aisle 
will go upstairs. Reverend Story will go into room three 
and Miss Larson upstairs, and will enroll the names, and us¬ 
ing reading as a test will try to grade and classify. I will do 
the same with those who remain here. Later we can classify 
better and get everyone nearly where they belong.” Mary’s 


IOO 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

system of organization worked perfectly and for two hours 
the rooms were alive with interest. 

Jim had the difficult section. His pupils were from 
twenty to seventy-five years old and spoke no English, and 
each family or group spoke a different European language. 
Jim first got paper and pencils and had the interpreters make 
each person or head of a family or group write all the names 
of their people and their ages in their own way. Then he 
had the interpreters get the information as to how much 
schooling each man and woman had had in their native coun¬ 
try and jotted that down himself after their names. In a 
half hour he had a pretty accurate estimate of each person 
present. 

This beginning was easy. When it was finished he stood 
up and looked over the room. There were peoples of half- 
a-dozen different languages whom he could not understand 
and whom he could not make understand and who could not 
understand each other and all of them were desperately anx¬ 
ious to learn this English of his and looked to him as the Moses 
who would solve all their difficulties. He was their promised 
land leader and they had absolute faith in him. Had he not 
said he would teach them ? 

Clearly the only way of school teaching that he knew any¬ 
thing about, the old time ABC method that led from a 
single letter of the alphabet up to syllables and then to words 
and sentences, would not do here. “Get me that bunch of 
animal pictures the wholesale house sent to us to illustrate 
the kindergarten method,” he told the interpreters. There 
was great scurrying around and they brought him an armful of 
big cards. “Just the thing,” said Jim, selecting a picture of 
a cow eating her breakfast from a haystack. He placed it in 
a good light where all could see and pointed to the animal and 
exclaimed: “Cow!” “Tell them I want everybody to look 
at the picture and say cow three times” and he held up three 
fingers. There was a grin all over the room as each interpre¬ 
ter told his or her group of people and they caught his idea. 
“Now all together,” said Jim and he led, and the roomful of 




IOI 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

people responded: “Cow, cow, cow!” Jim pointed to the 
stack and exclaimed: “Hay!” “Now all together say: 
hay, three times.” The interpreters instructed and the 
pupils chorused: “Hay, hay, hay!” with a vim and a grin. 
“Now what is this?” And Jim pointed to the cow and indi¬ 
cated an elderly man in a front seat. “Cow,” he promptly 
responded. “And this?” “Hay,” was the answer. He did 
this with half-a-dozen more men and women. Some of them 
lacked confidence to speak out but they improved as the ex¬ 
ercise became general. “Now say: Cow eats hay,” said 
Jim, “ and tell them what it means.” The interpreters did so. 
“Now all together three times.” The audience repeated the 
words three times clearly with enthusiasm. They were 
learning American at last and doing it in a very interesting 
way; in a way they could understand. He took the pictures 
of a horse standing still and one running and had them prac¬ 
tise the words: “Horse runs.” Then he pointed to the hay¬ 
stack in the original picture and had the interpreters ask 
what does the horse eat. “Horse eats hay,” was the general 
response. It was encouraging. Jim pointed to one of the 
boys and had them practice that word. Then he made the 
boy run across the room. Some of the audience immediately 
exclaimed: “Boy runs.” They remembered the word run 
without being retold. Then a girl was pointed out and she 
also ran across the platform. The exercises were interesting 
and amusing and the pupils were learning by playing and in 
half an hour all present had a working knowledge of about 
fifty American words and in an hour they had begun to com¬ 
bine ideas in these words. 

The question came up to Jim, as every problem he had 
attacked that night had been something new, why not com¬ 
bine learning to write with learning to talk. But here he 
struck a snag. It was easy for the foreigner to say cow and 
to learn the letter “c” and “o” and “w” but the sound of the 
letters “c” and “o” and “w” when combined had no earthly 
relation to the sound of the entire word cow. Not a single 
sound of a single letter could be found in the completed word. 


102 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

The word “eats” and “hay” could be understood better for 
some of the sounds of some of the letters were actually used 
in the words although it was mystifying to the foreigner 
what all the extra letters in the words were for. Jim also 
found no letters in the alphabet that corresponded to the 
sounds of “ow” and “ou” and “oi” and other such sounds in 
words and the long and short and medium vowels bothered 
and before he had been trying to teach writing to the big 
class for ten minutes by the alphabet method he was in 
despair. The sound of the letters combined didn’t make up 
the sound of the words in any case. He found our language 
was an altogether arbitrary make-up to the foreigner from our 
alphabet as soon as he tried to teach it and our spelling 
was a system of incomprehensible arbitrariness to them. He 
could easily teach them spelling if the sound of the letters 
made up the sound of the word but that practically never 
occurred. Then he tried to discard our spelling and teach 
them to write words according to the sound of the necessary 
letters, a phonetic system, but got into a tangle immediately 
and gave that up. While he was sweating over the problem 
Mary came in and he explained his difficulties to her in a low 
tone. “Why not just write the words: ‘Cow eats hay’ on the 
board and let them say them over and over and write them 
just as they are in words. Never mind the individual letters 
till afterwards. After they learn that ‘cow’ stands for that 
animal and they recognize the word anywhere then the al¬ 
phabet part may be taught. They can actually learn to 
read and write without learning the various individual sounds 
of the twenty-six letters with all their arbitrary variations.” 

“Good girl,” said Jim, “you’ve saved my life and also my 
face among these people for I was just at the point where all 
of them were beginning to wonder whether I wasn’t a four 
flusher and a false pretender when I began to mix them up 
in a criss-cross double and twisted knot tangle over the very 
beginnings of the American language. I see my way now. 
You’re a twenty-four-karat jewel with a real head on you 
and I congratulate myself on having the horse sense to marry 







BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 103 

you. I am going to turn over all my affairs to you after 

this. ,, 

“You’re a little mixed in your comparisons,” laughed 
Mary. “But you know teaching beginners is a woman’s 
job anyway, and a big awkward man can’t do it any more 
than he can bake a custard pie. However, you go ahead 
and I’ll continue to love you for the mistakes you make. 
Keep up a bold front. We are all getting along famously 
and in twenty-five minutes the bell will ring for closing. 
Just before the flag exercises at closing I want you to put the 
entire assemblage through a mental arithmetic drill for ten 
minutes. It will liven them up and be a good diversion.” 

“All right,” said Jim, turning and writing the words: “Cow 
eats hay,” on the board. “Now you trot out and I’ll have 
this class graduating by closing time.” In ten minutes he 
had them all industriously writing in American the words and 
ideas they had learned and when the bell rang everybody was 
enthusiastic over the progress they were making and all of 
them gathered up their papers and carefully pocketed them. 
They were going to practice at home. 

It was an entirely different throng that gathered in the big 
room for closing from that which had sat there two hours be¬ 
fore. There was enthusiasm and confidence on all sides. 
They had entered the vestibule of America. They were go¬ 
ing to be real Americans. They saw the road clearly. 

As soon as they were all seated Jim came to the front and 
said: “Everybody add this. As soon as you have it hold up 
your hand. Don’t tell your neighbor your answer. How 
much is four and five and three. Hurry, now, hold up your 
hand when done.” This was a surprise but many quickly 
understood and a dozen hands shot up in different parts of 
the room. “What’s the answer,” asked Jim, pointing to a 
girl in a far corner who had her hand up. “Twelve,” she 
answered, “Correct,” said Jim, “now how many had that 
answer? Don’t be afraid to own up if you are wrong be¬ 
cause it is no disgrace to be mistaken. We are just doing 
this for an exercise. Now add three and seven and five and 


io4 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

one.” This time a forest of hands went up. A mill worker 
in the middle of the room was pointed out and gave the right 
answer. Jim kept them on the run and it grew to be an 
exciting and exhilarating game in which some of the older 
people who understood some English showed a surprising 
aptness, especially when Jim proposed simple practical prob¬ 
lems to work out. In ten minutes he stopped and Carrie 
Ganz’s school class ranged themselves on the platform and 
went through the flag exercise. 

“Next Monday night at closing we will all do this exer¬ 
cise,” Mary announced, “and now school is out. Good¬ 
night, everybody.” 

The roadway was a jabber of tongues as the crowd strung out 
on their way home. The experiences of the evening to these 
people were legion. Each one had found something new and 
strange and questions by the hundred and explanations volun¬ 
teered could be heard all along. Here and there little groups 
stopped to hear some volunteer explainer tell the American 
way of doing something. The school had extended all down 
the roadway and continued in the homes along the long water¬ 
front where Jim’s home-made exercises were done over and 
over again and the other classrooms recalled their work in 
their school class till past midnight. 

The teachers were as much enthused in their after-school 
meeting and Carrie Ganz voiced a universal thought when in 
the medley of conversation she said: “Well, I wish the Ameri¬ 
can pupils were as earnest and eager to learn and as respectful 
as these foreigners are. I can see this work is going to be re¬ 
creation for me.” 

“We are under God’s guidance in this work,” said Jim. 
“Let us acknowledge His guiding hand in a short prayer ser¬ 
vice before we leave.” They all knelt down again while the 
minister invoked the divine blessing on their efforts. 

The next school night there was a largely increased atten¬ 
dance of scholars. Each one attending the first night had 
turned into an active propagandist for the school and did en¬ 
thusiastic missionary work to induce some of his or her friends 






BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 105 

to come and share the benefits. In addition there was an out¬ 
pouring of visitors. The fame of the first evening’s work had 
brought people from far and near. There were teachers and 
preachers and professors and farmers and millmen and their 
wives and other women; a general outpouring of the curious 
to see this educational spectacle. 

Jim took decided action at once. “All visitors must sit 
at the front on the platforms, altogether separate from the 
school students,” he announced, so plainly that there could 
be no misunderstanding. “This is a school for actual work,” 
he continued, “and while visitors are welcome we don’t want 
idlers among the pupils. Everyone in the school seats must 
be in the classes. Also the visitors must not move from room 
to room while we are working.” 

His announcement cleared the atmosphere. It em¬ 
phasized the idea to the foreigners that this was their school 
and that they were the privileged people in it and that these 
outsiders had no special rights there. The visitors also 
understood and flocked to the platform where seats were ar¬ 
ranged for them. 

Among the visitors was Professor Vinland, instructor of 
psychology at a State Training School. He introduced 
himself to Jim at the first recess of the evening. “I am 
making some interesting studies of fitness for citizenship 
among our immigrants from Europe as a member of a com¬ 
mittee,” he said, “and I’d like to make some tests here when 
an opportunity occurs. I can make the tests without any one 
knowing why they are made. 

“We have no objections whatever,” said Jim. “We’ll 
give you a chance later on and help out. I understand your 
main test is very simple.” 

“Oh, yes. Here is the first one I spoke of. It’s just a 
plain board with holes of various shapes and small objects 
to place in these holes. I have a number of others which I 
will show you as you go along.” 

“Well, we’ll allow you the privilege of going from room to 
room and you can pick out your own subjects and we’ll have 


106 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

them called into the rear room at the next intermission and 
the tests will be taken there. Then we’ll have their employ¬ 
ers or those who know them best give their opinion as to the 
value of your conclusions from your tests. I understand 
these tests are to gauge the mental efficiency and mental 
activity of the immigrant and thus gauge their fitness for 
United States citizenship. I don’t understand that you 
make any general test of their knowledge.” 

“Exactly, that is all there is to it. In some places it sup¬ 
plements the medical examination and the other designated 
examinations and furnishes a means of weeding out those 
below the average mental standard and who would not make 
good citizenship material.” 

“All right, you get to work and pick out fifty people and 
we’ll get them into the rear room. You make the tests and 
we’ll see what we’ll see. I’ll tell the other teachers what you 
are doing and also some of our intimate friends here. These 
foreign students will be given to understand that this is just 
another of our own exercises. Now it’s time to call school.” 

Professor Vinland circulated through the school and 
picked his subjects and they were assembled as Jim had out¬ 
lined and the tests made. At the close of the evening’s work 
the teachers and many of the visitors who had been invited 
by Jim assembled to see the professor’s report. He had 
graded the immigrants as very superior, superior, normal, 
sub-normal morons, feeble minded. “And what are we to 
understand by moron?” asked Mary. “That’s an individual 
who for instance has the age and physical frame of the grown¬ 
up person and the intelligence, mental ability, wilfulness, 
lack of reason and waywardness of a child of twelve,” said the 
professor. “They are not in the feeble-minded class and 
yet are not normal. Sub-normal are those who are slightly 
below normal. We regard anything below normal as unfit 
for American citizenship. They should be debarred, and if 
they arrived here as an immigrant they should be deported. 
We have out of this fifty one very superior, two superior, 
thirty-four normal, eight sub-normal, four morons, and one 



BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 107 

feeble minded. We have discarded all personal feelings and 
considerations and these results are just what the tests show.” 

“Let us see the names with the classification opposite 
each,” said Jim. “Here I see this boy is graded as a moron. 
He is only a boy of fifteen.” 

“Yes, that means that he has the body and appearance of 
a boy of fifteen but the mental outlook of the small child.” 

“ Let me see that,” said Jeff Stewart, a farmer who had come 
from close by to see the school and had been an interested 
visitor. “Why, that’s one of the very best and most efficient 
boys on the Pacific coast. I’ve had him work for me more or 
less for four months. Last week I sent him alone with a four- 
horse team fifty miles up into the Mount Baker country. He 
was gone four days, camped out, took excellent care of the 
horses, attended to the details of a somewhat intricate com¬ 
mercial transaction, and came back with his accounts correct, 
everything attended to, and his outfit in first-class shape. It 
was a man’s job and a good man’s job. I’ve hired him for the 
next six months and am giving him a man’s wages.” 

“I see you have this other man number three graded as 
very superior,” said Jim. “What do you think of that, Mr. 
Kirkpatrick? You’ve had him in your store long enough 
to know his capabilities.” 

“Yes,” said Kirkpatrick, who was a wholesale and retail 
merchant. “I know him thoroughly. I have tried hard to 
make something out of him. He’s the brightest, most versa¬ 
tile, surface knowledged, trickiest, most dishonest in word 
and deed and thought and action, most plausible and most 
learned in things that are un-American and that breed trouble, 
of all the young men that I ever met. I can see how it is 
that in a test like this he would be rated high. Every 
faculty he has and every bit of knowledge he has is at his in¬ 
stant command, is available for instant use. He can al¬ 
ways put his best foot forward. He has no depth or stability 
or reliableness but he has mental surface brightness to an un¬ 
common degree. He has been in the United States only a 
short time yet he is already a good surface English scholar, 


io8 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

has picked up bookkeeping and stenography, is a leading 
I.W.W. agitator, preaches atheism, advocates communism, 
will not work except when he has to, his word is no good, his 
social impulses are only kept in leash by fear of the law, and he 
is an undesirable direct from the points in Europe where 
they breed undesirables.” 

“I see this lady number ten is also graded as a moron,” 
said Jim. “What do you think of that, Mrs. Abel? You have 
had her work for you a great deal in the last few months.” 

“It may be,” said Mrs. Abel, who was a stout, bright-eyed 
matron of forty and a leader in both town and country life, 
“that she wouldn’t be very nimble fingered in picking up 
little tubes and squares and angles on a rig-a-ma-jig board 
like this and placing them in the proper holes or adjusting 
them to make up the proper geometrical figures. I think I 
wouldn’t be either. I’ve had her working most of the time 
for over a year. She is the best bread maker I ever saw. She 
is an excellent all-round housekeeper, far above the average. 
The rooms she attends to are models of neatness. She may 
not be able to put four little angles together quickly on this 
board to make a perfect circle but I can turn over our 
house to her and just leave it all to her, all topsy turvy after 
our five kids have dressed and had breakfast and started to 
school, and that means some real topsy turviness, and that 
house in two hours will be all perfectly arranged, in as good 
shape as any housekeeper could wish. Everything from the 
pins in the pin cushion in my little girl’s room in the attic to 
the coal scuttles in the cellar will be in place and clean and 
bright. She can cook a meal for a big family and gauge the 
time of cooking and quantity of materials so as to have a per¬ 
fectly satisfying family dinner. I doubt if she could learn to 
read quickly or to write like copper plate or paint sick-look- 
ing figures on sick-looking china saucers and she may be very 
clumsy in a test like this, but she’s a jewel in a home and has 
the brain of a real grown-up woman there.” 

“The results of your test seem to be open to some doubt,” 
said Jim. 






io9 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

‘‘They are the tests authorized by high authority,” said 
Vinland. “Our psychology experts all endorse them as giv¬ 
ing the gauge of standard mentality.” 

“Well,” persisted Jim, “how would you gauge Herbert 
Spencer, probably the greatest reasoner England ever pro¬ 
duced? He couldn’t learn the mutiplication table satisfac¬ 
torily and he couldn’t make a hoe handle, had no mechanital 
ability and couldn’t probably have arranged these geomet¬ 
ric figures on this board in twice the time that this nimble¬ 
fingered, surface-skimming young anarchist did. How 
about one of our greatest preachers? His memory for 
words was so defective that he wouldn’t trust himself 
to try and repeat the Lord’s prayer.” 

“The theory of our experts is that mentality or mind is the 
result of the whole brain working together when activated 
by life and its influences and if the mind is stupid the immi¬ 
grant is unfit.” 

“I doubt if that is true,” said Jim, “or rather I have no 
doubt as to its being basically untrue. The mind you are 
testing is surely not the product of the working of the whole 
brain. Blind Tom could remember any tune he ever heard 
once and create new music, but he had no reasoning powers 
at all. He was an idiot in reason. That musical ability was 
because one little corner of his brain, just one certain tea¬ 
spoonful of it, was fully developed. His whole brain or his 
whole mind had nothing to do with his musical ability. 
Herbert Spencer’s reasoning power was exceedingly great 
because one little corner of his brain, the reasoning corner, was 
developed. He was an idiot in ordinary mathematics. All 
men are idiots in some particular faculties, some particular 
corners of their brain are there only in embryo form and if 
you test along that particular line they may show as mental 
defectives. The particular teaspoonful of good brain ma¬ 
terial is not there in its particular corner. There may be 
some brain material there but it is not good material.” 

“That’s not our theory with regard to brain, mentality, 
and mind,” said Vinland. 


IIO 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

“And that’s just where I think you fall down in your 
tests,” said Jim. “For example, take memory. There is no 
such thing as general memory. Memory in any line of knowl¬ 
edge depends altogether on the development of the teaspoon¬ 
ful of brain where the particular faculty that deals with that 
particular line of thought or mental activity is located. 
There is a memory for words and a memory for figures and 
dates and numbers; and a memory for construction which 
gives facility in placing these little figures which you have 
here in their proper holes; and a memory for music; and a 
memory for location, which engineers must have; and a 
logical memory, which is a memory for causes and effects; 
and a revenge memory, which an Indian has for his enemies; 
and many other distinctive memories but no such thing as 
one general memory in which the whole brain acts. The 
individual who has a memory for words can remember any¬ 
where from one sentence to half a column of a newspaper 
when once read to him but put that same individual out in 
the woods through which he had traveled but once and he 
would probably become hopelessly lost because he had no 
memory for locality. The contour of the land, the trees and 
big rocks and hills and valleys had not been impressed on his 
brain because that particular corner of his brain was not 
there or was exceedingly small. He was an idiot as far as 
locality memory was concerned. A great engineer may not 
be able to memorize the simplest verse, but he would have a 
locality memory that would make him lost proof in any forest 
or strange country that he had ever passed through before. 
One person never forgets a name; another never remembers a 
name but never forgets a face. We have a boy right down 
here who can remember a whole column of figures but when 
he’s working he’ll lay his tools down any old place and can’t 
find them when he wants them. He has no orderly memory 
and he couldn’t repeat twenty words correctly after you had 
read them to him to save his neck. Now if you test any in¬ 
dividual along the line of his particular memory he will show 
up normal or above normal; if you strike the idiot part of his 



BIG JIM ALBRIGHT in 

brain—and we all have these corners—he’ll show up below 
normal.” 

“And there’s another phase, too,” said Kirkpatrick, “for 
which no provision is made in your test. Character is half 
of citizenship qualifications. Mental ability is only half. 
Down the road here we have our near neighbor who when he 
came here twenty years ago was the backwardest, greenest, 
most incompetent, awkwardest, seemingly stupidest young 
foreigner I ever met. Under your tests he would surely 
have been shut out. He had character. The elements of 
good citizenship were born in him. He went to work. To¬ 
day he is married, has a fine family, has a good farm home, 
is always on the law-abiding side, never shows brilliance but 
never fails to act with horse sense, is an asset to the commun¬ 
ity and the nation. This other young jackanapes who 
graded in your test to-night as very superior has twenty 
natural accomplishments to every one that this farmer had 
yet this young fellow will die in the penitentiary while our 
farmer neighbor will die a respected and honored citizen of 
this state. Character makes each what he is and will be and 
you do not test character.” 

“I am inclined to think you are right, gentlemen,” said 
Vinland, “and probably we had better find out facts and pro¬ 
vide a test in accordance with them rather than invent a 
psychology theory and provide a test based on it. Psy¬ 
chology, I see may be a wonderful success in a classroom in a 
college and a wonderful failure in practical life. We will 
come to your school again with your permission for it’s a 
revelation to us theory fellows. I’ve learned some things here 
and will box up this apparatus, lock the box, and throw the 
key away. Where an immigrant is feeble minded probably 
any ordinary test will be sufficient to detect it. Where 
they are normal, or approximately so, it requires something 
more than the theoretical test of a psychology expert.” 




CHAPTER VIII 


T HE management of the Sunday-school had practi¬ 
cally been turned over to Jim and Mary and they 
enjoyed the work more than any other part of their 
weekly duties. Jim was made superintendent and he inaugu¬ 
rated a new system. If the boys and girls of the church fami¬ 
lies were not there in their regular classes on Sunday morning 
either he or Mary went out to their homes and found out 
why and wherefore. If one of the oldest Bible-class students 
who was taught by Jim, or one of the kindergarten group, the 
little tots that were herded in one corner under Mary’s super¬ 
vision although in charge of three lieutenants, was missing, 
a direct inquiry was set on foot and they found out exactly 
why the absent one was not in his or her place. So zealous 
were they in this program that the mothers found it was 
easier to see that their children were up and dressed and ready 
for Sunday-school every Sunday morning than it was to 
apologize and make excuses, for if the child was not present 
the excuses most certainly had to be made. Jim was sure to 
be on hand to know just why, and a few visits of earnest in¬ 
quiry began to make the parents feel that they were the 
responsible ones and that there was a real culpability on their 
part if all their children were not turned out with the other 
cleanly dressed youngsters that chattered along the road 
toward the church on Sunday mornings. 

When Jim had got the church member families properly dis¬ 
ciplined in this matter of attendance and had the mothers 
actually afraid to permit a child to stay at home for anything 
less than a serious sickness he had started after the outsiders. 
He made it a business. He and Mary drove out at opportune 
times and practically rounded up all the families within reach 


112 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 113 

and he refused to take any ordinary excuse but good na- 
turedly kept calling and insisting till he had his way. Fami¬ 
lies that had never gone to Sunday-school before and whose 
parents never went to church were regular attendants. 

Jeb Hazard’s family was one of these outside families. 
Jeb was a free thinker. He was a hard-headed out-and-out 
agnostic, one of the Ingersoll school, not an infidel or an 
atheist but a man who said: “I don’t know whether there is a 
God such as the Christian God or not. I neither admit there 
is and acknowledge him as my God nor do I deny His exis¬ 
tence. I’m on the fence. I can’t make up my mind one way 
or the other.” He was a good neighbor and a good citizen 
otherwise. He loved his wife in his plain way and thought 
worlds of his girls. His baby daughter could wind him 
around her little finger, and if Jeb got a hint that any of his 
girls wanted something they got it if it was in his power. 
He had a good farm and was a good farmer. He liked Big 
Jim Albright but he was rockfast when it came to religion. 
Jim could go his way and be religious if he wanted to; he, 
Jeb Hazard, would be non-religious because he wanted to be 
non-religious. His wife was a quiet, patient little woman 
who thought a great deal of her husband and helped to make 
up the outer circle of the neighborhood women’s gatherings. 
She was never at the front of any social undertaking but was 
always rated as one of the “also presents,” filling out the 
mob scenes, and although not as conspicuous she was as 
necessary as the leaders, the women like Mrs. Abel, who 
organized and directed because they were born with missions. 
Mrs. Hazard had no mission of her own so she always just 
trotted along in the retinue of some leader who had a mission. 
The girls were nice, quiet, well-behaved, modest little misses, 
always neat in dress and quietly nice in deportment, neither 
flashy nor stupid, a little better than commonplace, a good 
deal like their mother. Mrs. Hazard had wanted one son at 
least to whose successful career she could pridefully contri¬ 
bute and whom she could pedestalize in her reflective mo¬ 
ments of leisure, but heredity or nature’s stupidity had treated 


11 4 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

her maternal wishes in a joking way and given her all daugh¬ 
ters. She didn’t repine over this because she loved her girls 
and her girls loved her and Jeb was satisfied with the girls 
and liked them better than boys anyway so her lot was not 
one to be querulous about. 

Jim’s line of attack was straightforward. He drove up to 
Jeb’s house and said to him after the customary greetings: 
“We want your girls to come to our Sunday-school, Jeb. 
We’ve got a good school, and we need them. We can’t run 
a Sunday-school without boys and girls, you know.” 

“I don’t know,” said Jeb slowly as he stuck his hay fork 
that he was using down into the ground and leaned on the 
handle. “Sunday-schools, you know, are a little out of our 
line. We don’t go very strong on church and Sunday-schools 
although we are not fighting them. If others want to keep 
them up we are dead willing, but we sort of figure they are not 
in our line. Since I got to be a man’s size I haven’t felt just 
like I needed the church doctrine crutch to keep me on my 
feet.” 

“You may not, Jeb, but isn’t there a lot of people in this 
world who do need some support? Don’t you know that 
there is a big crowd, nine hundred out of every thousand, 
who do walk straighter and firmer if they have something 
they can come into contact with to steady themselves and 
to sort of guide them along the pathway? When Ras Hooper 
was in the Montana blizzard he was telling us about the 
other day he felt mighty relieved when he reached the wire 
fence and could feel his way along it as a guide. A lot of us 
need something we can depend on in the storms of life, and if 
the regulations of Christianity are accepted as that guide 
they are useful to that extent. I suppose we will all con¬ 
cede that if a fellow follows them they will not lead him into 
trouble, at any rate. They will not lead him into greater 
danger so that at least he is no worse off. Now we want your 
girls to come to our school because it’s a community school 
organized to do good to the community and anything they 
hear or see there will be on the good side and they will neither 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 115 

hear nor see anything of evil. Every scholar at our school 
will be lined up with the better elements of our community 
life while in our school and we need the influence of your girls 
and they need the influences of our school. We need the 
help of yourself and Mrs. Hazard and the girls in our efforts 
to make our neighborhood a better and still better place to 
live in, and you need the help of the people in our Sunday- 
school for the same reason. We’re not making a religious 
campaign alone, although religion is the basis of our church 
and school, but if our religion and church and Sunday-school 
do not tend to and do not actually make this a more civilized 
country to live our daily lives in I’m willing to abandon all 
three. Now, we want the girls to come to our school and we 
want you and Mrs. Hazard to come, too, to see what we are 
doing. We’ve a school to be proud of. Now think it over 
and let us know. Good night, Jeb, it looks like it might 
rain.” 

“Good night! Jim, I’ll talk it over with Eliza and the 
girls.” 

Mrs. Hazard had been interestedly listening totheconversa- 
tion screened by the half-open door, and she moved away as 
Jeb came in. Jim’s invitation and arguments seemed to 
come in answer to her own intense wishes. She had wanted 
her girls to be among the children she saw going and coming 
on Sunday and she wanted to take part in that Sunday life 
herself and she wanted her husband with her in so doing, 
and her heart beat faster as he came in and washed his hands 
and face getting ready for the supper she had nearly prepared. 

Mrs. Hazard was of the class of country women whose 
life has something lacking. They feel they are shut out from 
their kind. They have their husband and children and their 
daily, never-ceasing round of drudgeries but that doesn’t fill 
their lives. They want society, a mingling with their own 
kind, not really the formal society of the card-leaving ladies 
of the well-to-do city world. That is a make-believe society 
that the card-exchanging ladies take to because they’re so 
numerous they crowd out the real society that every woman 


n6 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

wants, the mingling with a few people of congenial, fash¬ 
ionably dressed, somewhat formal-mannered and formal-acting 
other women, mixed with fashionably dressed and some¬ 
what formal-mannered and acting real men, among which 
real men they see their husbands are accepted at par, and 
among whose educated and high-grade children their own 
families are accepted as equals. The church is the only 
opening gate to any society that approximates their wishes 
and in addition it offers the spiritual thrill, and every wo¬ 
man wants a spiritual thrill in her life. It’s not complete 
without it. 

“Big Jim wants us all to go to Sunday-school to-morrow, ,, 
he said, as they were seated and Mrs. Hazard had begun to 
help the youngest girl. “Who all wants to go?” For a 
moment the girls all dropped their eating preparations. Sa¬ 
die, the eldest, stopped short in the middle of the floor with 
the tea in her hand and the others stared at him. Then as 
the full import of the question came to them they exclaimed 
in an excited chorus, “I do.” “And so do I,” said Mrs. 
Hazard as she turned away for an instant to hide her own 
excitement for her husband’s tone told her that Jim had won 
and all they needed to do was to hold what he had gained. 

“Well,” said Jeb, “Bob Ingersoll and Tom Paine wouldn’t 
stand much show with this crowd. Now if Sadie will bring 
on the tea and Lucy will get that dish of corn we’ll go ahead 
with our supper and to-morrow morning you can all primp 
up, including Mama here, and join the light brigade that 
marches past here on Sundays. If Big Jim had talked 
religion to me I think I’d be dead against it, but I guess he’s 
more than half right in his views. These churches and 
Sunday-schools do some good even if they do have foolish 
ways at times.” 

The girls were so excited that supper lost all interest for 
them. “Oh, goody,” said Bertha, the youngest. “Mama, 
shall I wear my pink dress to-morrow? You know it’s all 
done up.” 

“Just like a woman,” said Jeb. “The first thing is dress. 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 117 

I suppose Sadie and Lucy will want all sorts of new furbe¬ 
lows now.” 

Jim had provided special seats for just such contingent 
visitors as Mr. and Mrs. Hazard. He had reserved some 
pews right in the midst of the whirligig of Sunday-school 
classes, where the whirlpool of enthusiasm and youthful life 
was the most active and yet where all the various activities 
of the big Sunday-school work could be noted. It was like 
projecting Mr. and Mrs. Hazard from the quietude of 
their home life to a central seat where they viewed the ever- 
changing panorama of a big three-ringed circus. Wherever 
they looked there was something going on. Men and women 
and children were mixed and mingled and on every side was 
life. The faces of the children in their various classes was a 
study in themselves. There were all sorts of expressions, 
but every face was a happy face. The Hazards were not 
alone in their amazement and their pleasure, however, for at 
least twenty other fathers and mothers were there with 
them as onlookers and other fathers and mothers were 
scattered around taking part in the fray as class teachers. 

Jim had one very strong opinion in regard to Sunday- 
school work: That the real Bible should be taught there, 
especially the New Testament, and that the way to make 
the teaching real was to have the boys and girls learn it by 
heart. He had said to the assembled teachers at their first 
meeting: “My experience is that we never get the real good 
out of anything that just comes to us. We really only en¬ 
joy the things we work for and we really only understand the 
knowledge we dig after and labor for. If there’s no work 
there’s no understanding, and my plan is to make our boys 
and girls get in and dig for themselves. Any scholar who 
learns the New Testament so they can repeat it verse by verse 
and word for word has a good foundation for understanding it 
and a good foundation for a Christian life. If they will not 
labor and strive to become Christians because they want 
to become Christians bad enough so that the labor is a pleas¬ 
ure we can do but little for them. I am in favor of having 


118 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

our Sunday-school scholars, big and little, know the Bible 
itself, not somebody’s explanation of what there is in the 
Bible, and the way to begin to know the Bible is to learn 
exactly what the Bible itself says, to know its own real 
words. If our scholars learn the real words they have a solid 
foundation laid.” 

So the plan was adopted, and an extensive system of merit 
cards also adopted showing the progress of everyone in the 
classes in learning Scripture verses, and the repeating of 
these was made a main feature of each Sunday’s work. 
There soon developed a competition that was country wide, 
and at the homes it became the rule for each boy and girl to 
learn a certain number of verses each day so that by Sunday 
they had only to review their weeks’ task and they had quite 
a number learned. A keen competition and rivalry grew up 
between certain individuals in different classes and also be¬ 
tween whole classes. 




CHAPTER IX 


I T HAD been the custom of the Sunday-school to have an 
annual picnic on the Puget Sound beach early each spring 
and the time was close at hand. “ I think we should make 
an effort to get the old people who are too feeble to go out 
much to our picnic this year,” said Mary one night when she 
and Jim were talking over the plans, “Why couldn’t we 
have volunteer autos call for all the old folks in the vicinity, 
those who are not able to get around themselves, and bring 
them to the church and then on to the picnic? The day 
will be warm and it would give them an enjoyable time, I 
am sure.” 

“Yes, and we could extend it so as to include all those 
who cannot get out,” said Jim. “There’s Jessie Leighton, 
partly paralyzed and lying in bed all the time. Why not 
bring her out in an auto to the beach? And Jack Stavely in 
the hospital with his broken leg. It’s in suth shape now 
that he could ride in an auto; and the two little girls in the 
care of the sisters that are crippled so badly by infantile 
paralysis. We could gather up a hundred old people and 
cripples and have them come with their nurses to take care of 
them, and with a little extra work give them all one day of 
real enjoyment and change from the monotony of their usual 
daily life. We can do it and must do it. Let’s make a list. 
Now you write the names.” The list of names grew beyond 
their first guess as to number and then they made another 
list of people who had autos who could and probably would 
carry the old people and invalids. Before they finished it 
was past midnight. 

The picnic morning came, a typical Puget Sound morning. 
There was a slight fog and a calm quiet air, sure harbingers of 

119 


120 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

a perfect day. The sun came up and the fog moved away, 
disappeared on silent wings into the cloudland above, leav¬ 
ing a clear, blood-purifying air, climatic medicine for the 
million; liquid flowing balm of generous Nature, free to all 
and undefiled. The countryside was astir early. Youth was 
to be at the helm for the day and youth was up and dressed 
and driving parents and older brothers and sisters. 

The finishing touches had to be put on the grounds. A 
crowd of volunteers under John Morgan, the head carpenter, 
had put up the swings and the merry-go-rounds and the 
platforms and the long lines of tables and the seats and 
cleared away brush in the grove near by and run a temporary 
water pipe line from the hill above and a short gas pipe line 
for the gas ranges. They were out now just after daybreak to 
complete everything finally and make sure nothing was left 
undone. They were the handy gang, the rough workers, the 
indispensables, and they would be back home in time to 
change their work clothes before breakfast and be ready for 
the real day’s duties on other committees. 

By nine o’clock Mrs. Abel had marshalled her forces as 
field superintendent of the day’s work. She had control of 
the men and the delivery wagons and light trucks that were 
to gather up the eatables in baskets and the knives, forks, 
spoons, dishes, pots, pans, kettles, and table ware of differ¬ 
ent kinds. “She was the right man in the right place,” as 
Jim put it. She singled out one of the small trucks to hustle 
down and get the gas ranges for the ground and connect them 
up. Then she divided the remainder and ordered them over 
the different routes and picked out two girls to go with each 
driver to help him handle and pack his load so that the eat¬ 
ables would not be mussed up and the cutlery and other 
light articles lost. “You men are all right, but you need us 
women to boss you,” she said as she gave them all the signal 
to go. “Now all you men have to do is the work. The 
girls that go out with you boys are your bosses. You are 
not to speak to them unless they want you to and you are to 
salute every woman along your route with a regular military 


121 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

salute. They are all your superiors to-day.” It was a good 
beginning and the basis for general good humor as the caravan 
divided up and honked its way in different directions. Then 
Mrs. Abel gathered her main band of workers in a few trucks 
she had detained and went direct to the grounds. 

The program stated: “Literary exercises in Clark's grove 
at eleven o'clock; dinner at twelve-thirty; sports and socia¬ 
bility all the afternoon.” It gave no details, but a literary 
and a sports committee had been appointed and they had 
these programs well in hand. At eleven o’clock the big 
grove was thronged, the main crowd being around the cen¬ 
tral platform. Then came a surprise to many of the on¬ 
lookers. Jim's flying squadron of autos, under his own 
personal direction, began to arrive and unload the aged and 
the cripples. Grandma Springer, ninety-three years old, 
but chipper and alert, using a cane for a slight lameness, was 
assisted on the platform by Jim and given a front seat. Then 
followed the procession of very old people, all wrinkled and 
gray, many of them stooped and shrunken in figure and feeble 
of gait, but all dressed in their best and with faces showing 
plainly they were out on an enjoyable holiday. Other autos 
drove up and willing hands gently unloaded from them men 
and women and boys and girls on white hospital cots. Jessie 
Leighton, partly paralyzed, and Robert Melhorn, convales¬ 
cent from an amputation of his right leg, and Willie Sanders 
and Dora Brown, infantile paralysis cripples, and a great 
number of other unfortunates were ranged around the front 
where they could see and hear everything that went on. 
There was no sign of pain or weariness. They were wide 
awake, and the array of bright eyes that looked out from the 
cots showed the eager expectancy with which they looked 
forward to their picnic day. When they arrived there was 
at once a jam to the front by the crowd and every picnicker, 
big and little, in the groves or on the beach, gathered around 
the central platform. 

Jim wasted no time in making a beginning. He gave a 
signal and led the way up on the platform with Reverend 


122 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

Story and was followed by Mary with the groups of children 
and teachers who were to take an active part in the plat¬ 
form exercises. His idea of having only one short talk by 
the minister after an opening prayer and the rest of the pro¬ 
gram mainly singing was carried out. There was a play, 
part of it in pantomime, by forty little girls dressed in white. 
They had been drilling on it for a month. Then followed 
recitations by one of the older boys and girls and class and 
congregational singing that filled the groves with melody 
and gave everybody a chance to take part. When the first 
splendid chant of the big crowd burst forth with a great 
organ on the platform leading it was too much for Grandma 
Springer and the tears rolled down her furrowed cheeks. A 
sympathetic joy weeping spread and soon a dozen of the old 
ladies were dabbing at their eyes with handkerchiefs. The 
pleasure was overpowering to them who had just come from 
the narrow confines of their secluded daily homes into such a 
whirlwind joyfest of youth and energy and palpitating life. 
They cried for gladness. Some of the crippled ones on the 
cots around the platform front joined in the songs at the very 
beginning and they were soon all singing with the crowd. 

Their presence there in their physical helplessness added the 
necessary atmosphere to complete the realization by the 
vast and acutely sensitive throng of the perfect faith that 
makes perfect petition in song out of the splendid old hymns: 
“Rock of Ages, Cleft for Me” and others of the same spiritual 
power. The real emotional fervor, the inward exaltation 
that carries humanity from finite to infinite, from earth to 
heaven, from man to God, stirred all the assemblage. As 
the hymns were sung it was voiced in the softened cadences of 
pleading prayer from the soul depths of men and women and 
boys and girls who, strengthened and uplifted by the com¬ 
munity chrisitan belief of the mass of humanity around 
them, looked with the clear, undimmed eyes of absolute faith 
up through the blue cloudland above and sang to the very 
Christ Himself, the savior of men wearing his glorified crown 
of thorns, and again as the tide of Christian sentiment changed 


123 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

the same voices rolled and billowed out through the barriers 
of the wood and over the near-by sea in tones of triumphant 
praise to the same blessed Redeemer. 

“If you want anything well done let George do it,” said 
Jim from the platform when the program was about finished. 
“We appointed George Jones on the committee to provide 
music. He organized himself into an independent sub-com¬ 
mittee and went to the city and captured two foreign quar¬ 
tettes. One of them is just driving up. It is the colored 
quartette from Nashville and they will sing to us three songs 
and then leave us as they have to appear elsewhere. The 
other is a quartette of Welsh singers. No other white people 
on earth have voices that equal the Welsh. Probably no 
people ever lived that had such voices or such finished voice 
culture. They have attained perfection of voice and perfec¬ 
tion of technique. It is going to be a rare treat to hear these 
two quartettes out here in this grove by the sea on a day like 
this.” 

This was another surprise, and the colored troupe was re¬ 
ceived with a storm of applause. They sang only Southern 
plantation melodies and were recalled again and again. Just 
as they left the Welsh quartette drove up. They were re¬ 
ceived with an even more enthusiastic welcome for the audi¬ 
ence was keyed up by the singing of the colored quartette. 
Their opening was a chant from an oratorio and showed the 
exquisite harmony that perfect tone blending could produce. 
It was a revelation to the audience, most of whom had never 
heard real Welsh singing before. They were recalled and re¬ 
called till Jim came to the front and announced that he was 
going to save the lives of the singers by closing the literary 
program and inviting all to the dinner that was going to be 
served in five minutes. “We have spent an hour and a half 
here now. It has passed like a dream. I hope our entire 
day will be a dream day that we will always remember.” 

The cooks flew to their ranges, the waiters to their tables. 
Everything was in readiness except to serve the food. The 
cooking had been done early and a relay had kept everything 


124 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

warm. It was a wholesale job and Mrs. Abel, who had charge 
of the serving of the dinner, had the breadth of vision to 
realize it all beforehand and prepare plenty to eat, just 
like a farm dinner at home, and a plentiness of help to 
carry it on to the tables. Platoons of young men and girls 
worked in couples as waiters: women did only the cooking 
and the dishing up, as the boss called it. She said no mere 
man could either cook or properly serve a meal but they could 
be beasts of burden and carry the heavy pans and pots of 
food to and from the tables under proper supervision so she 
placed each young man strictly in charge of his particular 
girl and he was to do exactly as she told him. If he didn’t 
do so she had authority to punish him in any way she wanted 
to. It was a highly agreeable arrangement and got the 
largest amount of work done in the shortest time. 

The old people and the cripples were the guests of honor at 
the dinner. The aged ones had a long table to themselves 
at the head of which the minister sat and which was attended 
by a specially chosen detachment of waiters whose instruc¬ 
tions were to leave nothing undone. The cots of the helpless 
ones were arranged in two parallel lines and each two cots had 
one girl waitress in addition to the nurses. The older Sun¬ 
day-school girls all wanted this job and the pleas were so ur¬ 
gent that the waiters on the cots and at the old people’s table 
were trebled. “Oh let them help,” said Jim to Mrs. Abel. 
“You know you womenkind are never satisfied unless you 
are doing something for somebody. The girls are only 
running true to form.” Mrs. Abel laughed and told the girls 
to go ahead and help w T herever they could find a place. In 
their eagerness they fairly swarmed over the nurses and took 
their patients away from them. 

The tables were all filled and extra tables improvised and 
groups who could find no room at the tables were organized 
and served in the handout style. Everyone had just started 
his or her dinner and the chatter of voices was making the 
grove a babel when there was an interruption. 

A couple of automobiles came up the road from the direc- 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 125 

tion of the city in a cloud of dust, honking one continuous 
honk. They swept right up to the dinner tables and plowed 
the ground up with their wheels as the drivers jammed down 
on the brakes. They created a panic at that end of the 
ground for it seemed as if they were going to run squarely 
into the table occupied by the old people and a number of 
the picnickers narrowly escaped being run down. The autos 
were filled with men and boys. 

“Beg your pardon!” said the driver of the first machine as 
Jim hurried to them. “We came to the picnic; see we’re a 
little late. Sorry to have kept you all waiting.” He spoke 
thickly and Jim saw that he was drunk. The others were 
getting out and it appeared as if all were drunk—some of them 
too drunk to stand alone. Jim recognized their faces as 
those of some young fellows he had seen in the city. 

“I don’t know that you boys belong to our Sunday-school 
and this is a Sunday-school picnic,” said Jim. “You had 
better continue on down the road to the hotel a mile farther 
on. You can get dinner there.” 

“Oh, yes, we belong to the Sunday-school, all right, all 
right,” said the driver in a thick, intoxicated tone. “Oh, yes, 
we belong. If we don’t we’ll join, all right, all right, all right,” 
and he kept on mumbling as he tried to get out of the auto 
which he finally did by falling out. “We belong, boys, 
don’t we?” he continued as he struggled up by holding on to 
the fender. “If we don’t, we’ll join; won’t we, boys?” he 
continued on in his mumbling way. By this time the others 
had crowded forward and many of the diners had left their 
dinners, some of them showing anger at the thought of the 
danger the reckless drivers had brought to their families and 
their friends, particularly the aged ones. 

“Yes, we’ll join,” mumbled another young fellow who had 
sort of tumbled out and was holding to the curtain of the auto 
to steady himself. “How much is it? How much is the ini¬ 
tiation fee? I’ll pay for the bunch, here’s three hundred and 
fifty, no, four hundred and fifty dollars, take the cost out of 
that. I’ll pay for the bunch, I will. Take it all if you think 


126 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

it’s worth it,” and he threw a big roll of crumpled bills which 
he took from one pocket and another roll from another and 
several more bills from each of his vest pockets in front of 
Jim on the auto engine cover. He spoke even more thickly 
than the drunken driver and swayed as he talked. 

‘Til tell you what we’ll do,” said Jim, who had been work¬ 
ing his brain for some solution of the embarrassing problem. 
The boys were evidently not bad boys. They were good- 
natured but drunk. They had probably heard of the picnic 
in town and had started for it in their drunken enthusiasm. 
“ I’ll tell you what we will do. Our tables are all full. There’s 
not room for one more anywhere. You see these fellows out 
here. We couldn’t find room at the tables for them. They 
have to stand up and eat. Now you boys all get in your autos 
again and back up to the cross roads and we’ll bring your 
dinner to you.” 

“Thanks very much, very kind indeed,” said another who 
was just as drunk as his companions, “but we came here to 
help. I’ll be a waiter, I will. So will the other fellows. 
Won’t we, boys?” and he looked around in drunken stupidity 
and nearly fell over when he started to change his position. 

“Yes. We’ll be waiters,” said the driver, taking the cue. 
“We’ll wait on the tables with the girls and then the girls 
and us will all have family dinner together. We don’t 
mind waiting for the second table. We want to help out. 
Just introduce us to the ladies and we’ll pick our partners 
and wait on the tables or the girls can pick us for partners, 
we don’t care which. We don’t care which, do we, boys?” 
His voice became blurred as he ended and his head wobbled as 
he sort of sank down on the fender. There was an assent 
from the bunch in his car; a sort of a mixture of hiccoughed 
assents made with drunken gravity for every boy in the crowd 
was trying to appear strictly sober and evidently believed 
he was making everybody present believe that he was 
strictly sober. 

They knew with the intuition of a drunken man that Jim 
and his crowd were sober and that they frowned on whiskey 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 127 

and men who drank whiskey and that the proper thing for 
them to do was to be sober themselves and act like gentle¬ 
men, and they had the universal drunken man’s delusion 
that they were fooling Jim and all the onlookers. Their 
brains and bodies were ready to tumble around and were 
tumbling around when either brain or body tried to make a 
quick move but they really thought they were posing as 
alert, dignified, amiable, gentlemanly young fellows. They 
didn’t even realize that flasks were showing in a dozen 
pockets. 

‘‘I’m afraid,” said Jim, who had thought up a new device 
to get rid of them without any more noise when he was 
stopped in his speech by Mary whispering to him: “That’s 
Earl Abel asleep in the farther auto.” Jim looked there and 
sure enough young Earl Abel, seventeen years old, sat 
hunched over in the rear seat in a heavy sleep. Jim took in 
the situation at a glance and whispered back to Mary: “Keep 
Mrs. Abel busy back there for a few minutes and we’ll get him 
out and send him to our house. He’s dead drunk. It’s 
awful!” 

Mary swiftly turned to run back to the kitchen where 
Mrs. Abel was working but she was too late. Mrs. Abel 
had seen the commotion and had paid little attention to it 
at first but as it continued she came from the kitchen and 
walked toward the crowd. She arrived just as Earl was dis¬ 
covered and heard the offer made by the boy who spoke 
last. Any one could see just what the entire situation meant 
and what it was with all its angles, and as her eyes swept the 
scene and understood it she saw Earl. Her face paled but she 
did not falter. Quietly she made her way around the crowd 
and to the side of the auto. “Earl,” she said, taking him by 
the arm. Earl did not move. He was sleeping like a man 
who had taken a heavy dose of morphine. “Earl,” said 
Mrs. Abel again and she shook him. He did not awake. 
She shook him again roughly. He moved uneasily, that was 
aH. 

“Let me help you,” said Jim, whose own face had set with 


128 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

stern lines as he brushed the drunken crowd to one side and 
strode to the rear. He gtasped Earl by the shoulder and 
knee and lifted him out of the auto as if he had been a baby. 
Then he gave him a shake that rattled his teeth as if he had 
the ague. A flask of whiskey fell out of Earl’s pocket. Jim 
set one heel on it and smashed it. The boy half opened his 
eyes stupidly as if a haze was before them and his numbed 
brain seemed to realize that something was doing around him 
and that he should be an actor in the doings. He tried to 
stand on his feet but his head was swimming and to him the 
world was whirling around, doing a jazz dance. He saw his 
mother and Jim and they were whirling around. It seemed 
to him as if there were twenty mothers and twenty Jims. 
He drew his hand across his blurred eyes but it didn’t clear 
his vision or stop the antics of the mad old world. It still 
whirled and whirled. He tried to step and he staggered. 
The ground kept coming up to meet his feet and met them too 
quickly. His mother caught him, put her arm around him 
and guided him away to the rear. There were tears in her 
eyes and her face was deathly white but she had a mother’s 
duty to perform and she did not falter. Mary and others 
went with her, silent sympathizers who were as helpless as 
children. They could neither say nor do anything that would 
either help or undo what had been done. A boy of seventeen 
raised in a Christian home, his parents leaders in the church, 
himself a member of the Sunday-school-Bible class, the 
members of which were all in their places at the picnic except 
him, had been sent to the city that morning on an errand 
by his mother and was to be back by ten o’clock. He did 
not come home but she was busy at the picnic and did not 
worry. In her estimation Earl was safe wherever he was. 
He had been detained somewhere and would appear. He 
had never tasted liquor in his life before; and here he was, 
beastly drunk, among a gang of other beastly drunken boys. 

His mother had only gone a few steps away with Earl when 
two other automobiles swept up. They did not come quite 
as fast or as recklessly as the first two did but they came too 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 129 

fast for safety and the crowd fled as they saw them headed 
directly into their midst. Jim stood his ground alone and 
the front auto driver jammed on his brakes and plowed the 
ground and stopped within a few feet of him. The drunken 
boys made their way to the newcomers. 

“Well, we took your dare and here we are,” said one of the 
boys to the driver as he got out of the first machine. “We’re 
going to get in on the picnic. It’s all fixed up. We fixed it 
up. We’re going to wait on table and join the Sunday- 
school, we are.” 

“So, so,” said the driver who was Lew Delker. His eye 
was on Mrs. Abel and Earl instead of on the boys, and he 
grinned maliciously and winked to his companions in his auto 
to look in the direction where Mrs. Abel was half carrying 
Ean from the grounds. Then he turned to the boys. “So 
you are all fixed up, are you? Well, that’s good. We 
couldn’t travel as fast as you sports so I guess we’ve missed 
being fixed up. It’s our luck. Hello, Jim, how are you, old 
boy? Shake hands! I see you are having gay doings and 
I’m glad our boys are going to help out. Your picnic’s 
bound to be a success with them in it.” 

Jim brushed the proffered hand to one side. There was 
something of a steel glint in his eyes and his voice had a ring 
that was not the usual sound. “So you are the fellow who 
brought the moonshine saloon out and dumped it at our 
picnic dinner. I didn’t think you would do it, Lew Delker. 
Our Sunday-school people are neither moonshiners nor boot¬ 
leggers nor do they wish to drink with moonshiners or 
bootleggers nor associate with that class of people.” 

Delker laughed rather uneasily. He was clearly under the 
influence of liquor himself but not drunk. He was on the 
defensive in the presence of not only his crowd but hundreds 
of others who were evidently hostile to his act and his atti¬ 
tude. He realized that he was in the wrong but he had the 
pugnacity of several drinks of whiskey to nerve him up and 
he had to make a show. 

“I’m not so sure about the drinking,” he said, flipping his 


130 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

thumb toward Mrs. Abel and Earl. “ Seems to me some of 
your people like a quiet snort now and then. Isn’t that 
right, boys?” and he again smiled maliciously toward his 
crowd and flipped his thumb in the direction of Earl. 

Jim’s voice had an angry snap in it as he towered above 
Delker and looked down on him. “It seems to me that a 
gang of grown-up men are in small business to waylay a lad 
of seventeen who happens to be in town alone and send him 
home drunk.” 

“I don’t know about the waylaying,” said Delker. 

“You did know that he never took a drink of whiskey in 
his life before and you knew that his folks were bitterly 
opposed to whiskey and you had the moonshine or the boot¬ 
leg liquor and you got him to take it and you are a grown-up 
man. Was that a brave act on your part? Was there any 
nobility or good citizenship in it?” 

“Well, if it hadn’t been for such people as her,” indicating 
Mrs. Abel again by a flip of his thumb, “there wouldn’t have 
been any chance for the boy to get drunk. She and the 
other cranks of her kind put through a law by trickery that 
put honest liquor out of business and moonshine and bootleg 
stuff has taken its place. If we had legal drinking places 
these thousands of boys would not be going around with 
flasks in their hip pockets and there wouldn’t be one 
man drunk where there are ten now. Give a fellow a chance 
to walk up to a bar and get a glass of whiskey for ten cents 
and he is not going to buy a bottle and carry it around with 
him. It’s the bottle moonshine whiskey that makes men 
drunk. The drinking by the glass at the bar keeps him 
sober. If we had decent saloons that boy would never have 
had a chance to take a pull at a bottle.” 

“So it’s the prohibition law that is at the bottom of all the 
trouble ?” 

“Yes, and it was put over by trickery. The people of this 
country are against it. There’s no public sentiment for it.” 

“It carried by one of the greatest majorities ever given any 
amendment to the United States constitution.” 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 131 

“I don’t care if it did. Public sentiment is against it. 
Tt can’t be enforced.” 

‘‘Why will the people of the United States not obey it if it 
is the law of the land? Why can’t it be enforced?” 

“Why will the people of the United States not obey it if 
it is the law of the land?” Jim repeated as Delker paused to 
hunt a reply. 

“Because it interferes with the personal liberty of every 
American citizen. You have no right to say by law what a 
man shall eat or drink. Because a few men make swine of 
themselves by too much drinking or by gluttony in eating 
that is no reason for taking away the personal liberty of every 
American citizen in the matter of choosing what he shall 
drink or eat.” 

“Then these young fellows here with their whiskey bottles 
in their hip pockets are exercising their personal liberty rights 
to-day.” 

“Exactly, they have the same right to a picnic program of 
their own choosing as your folks have, and if they get en¬ 
joyment out of a few drinks it is their right as American 
citizens to picnic that way. They are American citizens en¬ 
joying their inalienable personal liberty privileges.” 

“These boys come here with flasks of bootleg or moonshine 
whiskey, the only kind any one can get to-day in this country. 
We have a law made by a tremendous majority of the Ameri¬ 
can people which says in effect that any man who manufac¬ 
tures whiskey in the United States or bootlegs whiskey into 
the United States over the border or trades in such whiskey 
is a criminal. This law was made because the great majority 
of the American people concluded that whiskey was a men¬ 
ace to American civilization. The American people made a 
similar law with regard to cocaine and heroin and opium for 
exactly the same reasons. They are a menace to American 
civilization. If you and these boys can set aside the whiskey 
prohibition law you can set aside the narcotic drug laws also 
and you can set aside the law prohibiting the carrying of 
revolvers or the law that prohibits one man from killing an- 


132 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

other except in self-defense. Every law in the American code 
that prohibits crime was made by a majority of the American 
people for exactly the same reasons that the prohibition law 
was made. These crimes all menace American civilization. 

“The same principle of personal liberty that you assert 
as to the prohibition law applies to every criminal law on our 
statute books both state and national. It makes every man 
the judge of what he may do. It is anarchy in its simplest 
form. It gives the individual unlimited liberty to do as he 
pleases and does away with all government. It overturns 
the American system of government for its says the Ameri¬ 
can system of majority government is not to be recognized 
and that any individual can throw aside any law the majority 
makes and substitute his own wishes for that law whenever he 
thinks himself into the belief that the law infringes on his per¬ 
sonal liberty. I heard that you intended to be a candidate for 
a minor judicial position in the city, Mr. Delker. If a boot¬ 
legger is caught with his whiskey or a moonshiner is caught 
making one thousand gallons of whiskey or a resident of the 
city is caught with a cellar full of whiskey he just bought or a 
pedler of whiskey is caught with his whiskey in his auto and 
these criminals are brought before you, are you going to turn 
them loose because you think their personal liberty is in¬ 
fringed by the prohibition law? This prohibition law is part 
of the American constitution. If you turn them loose you 
must as a judge on the bench declare the American constitu¬ 
tion to be unconstitutional because it interferes with your 
idea of personal liberty. Travel your personal liberty route 
any direction you please and when you arrive at the far end 
you are an anarchist.” 

As Jim went on the picnickers sensed something unusual and 
they all left the tables and crowded around and a cheer 
went up as he stopped. 

“You’ve sewed him up, Jim,” shouted one. “No anarchist 
judge for us,” shouted another. “Bootlegging is a crime 
in the United States and always will be,” came from another 
corner. Delker shifted uneasily and attempted a joking 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 133 

counterplay by saying with a shallow laugh, “Oh, well, I 
guess there always will be differences of opinion as to these 
political matters.” 

“But this is not a political matter,” interjected Jim. 
“Now see here, Mr. Delker, this prohibition law was a politi¬ 
cal matter up to a certain point but when over two thirds of 
the states in this American union stated most emphatically 
by immense majorities that whiskey was a menace to Ameri¬ 
can civilization and the public feeling was so strong that they 
made this law part of the American constitution it passed 
from being a political matter to a strictly legal and govern¬ 
mental matter. The American constitution is the supreme 
law of the land. This prohibition law is part of the supreme 
law of the land. You can’t evade it by saying it is a political 
matter. You obey the supreme law of the land or you’re a 
criminal. If you’re a criminal along the line of your personal 
liberty theories you’re more than an ordinary criminal. 
You’re a clear-cut anarchist.” 

“Well, the constitution can be amended the same way itwas 
amended before and if this prohibition law was put in there 
by two-thirds majority of the American people it can be cut 
out by the same majority.” 

“That’s true, but that’s not personal liberty talk. That 
doesn’t mean the American people bootlegging and moon- 
shining and drinking mad poisons and flouting the law and 
making criminals out of themselves and declaring they are 
anarchists; although they call it personal liberty. But in 
talking about striking out the prohibition law you have to 
take into account that it was made part of the constitution 
by nearly an unanimous vote. It has been tried, and the 
theory of these majorities has been justified. It has emptied 
jails and penitentiaries, decreased public expenses, bettered 
the public health of the people, promoted morality, lessened 
crime, made the working man his own boss by dethroning 
the saloon keeper who formerly took his money and bossed 
him. It pays grocery bills instead of whiskey bills, buys 
boots and shoes and clothes and autos and books and heat and 


i 34 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

light and the comforts of life. It is making a new race of 
men and women who don’t know whiskey and abhor it if 
they see it and its effects. It is making homes and family 
life. Whiskey was tried and publicly hanged because it was a 
menace to American civilization. Prohibition is being 
crowned with laurel because it is unifying, constructing, main¬ 
taining and building up every real American principle. 
You’ll have just the same chance of cutting the whiskey pro¬ 
hibition law from the constitution that you will have in cut¬ 
ting out the principle of majority government that is in the 
constitution and substituting your anarchist law, your per¬ 
sonal liberty theory. Now our dinner is getting cold. If 
you folks will acquiesce in our regulations enough to smash 
your whiskey flasks and join us we’ll be glad to share what¬ 
ever we have to eat with you but we can’t compromise with 
your whiskey.” 

“What do you say, boys, to the invitation?” asked Delker, 
turning to his crowd. There was a hurried consultation. 
“Our fellows feel that it would be intruding if we joined in 
your dinner,” said Delker, “and we’ll wish you an enjoyable 
time and go on our way down to the other side of the bay.” 

“All right,” said Jim, “good luck to you,” and turned and 
made his way back to the tables. 

“Come on, boys,” said Delker, “we’ll drive round the bay 
and have our own little picnic in our own little way. I guess 
we can enjoy life even if we don’t belong to a Sunday-school 
when we have the enjoyments with us right here in our hip 
pockets.” 

Some of the crowd clambered into the two autos that came 
last but there was hesitation manifest on the part of others 
who were among the first crowd of boys. “Say,” said the 
driver of the first auto that arrived, “what was that Big 
Jim said about criminals? What was that Big Jim said 
about criminals ?” He repeated as if trying to get hold of the 
idea. The whiskey was evidently working out of his brain 
and he was getting back to normal. 

“Why,” said another boy who was sitting on a fender with 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT i 3S 

his elbows on his knees and his head resting on his hands 
as if he were asleep although he seemed to have been wide 
awake, “why, he said every fellow who made moonshine 
and every fellow who bootlegged and every fellow who sold 
moonshine or bootleg or bought it and toted it around was a 
criminal. He said they were all criminals, and that’s us, for 
some of us are moonshiners and some bootleggers and some 
sell and some buy and all carry it around. That’s us. Big 
Jim spotted us all right even if he didn’t know it. We’re 
criminals all right, we are,” and he relapsed back into silence 
as if asleep again. 

“That’s what I thought,” said the first boy, “but I wanted 
someone else to understand it just as I did. I guess I’m 
some drunk but I can savvy some English yet. Now if I’m a 
criminal I’m going to reform right here. I’m drunk, but 
I’m going to reform. I’m a criminal, but I’m an American 
and I’m more American than criminal and I’m for the old 
constitution, Big Jim’s old American constitution just as she 
stands, just as she stands, prohibition law and all. I’m an 
American, boys, and I’m going to reform, see,” and he pulled 
one bottle from his inside coat pocket and another from his 
hip pocket and went deliberately over to a big rock near by 
and smashed them. “ I’ve quit being a criminal, fellows, I’ve 
quit all right,” and he walked back to his auto. 

The words and action brought on a general movement and a 
dozen small flasks came into view from inside pockets and hip 
pockets. Delker had already got into his big machine pre¬ 
paratory to leading the way down the road, but the statement 
of the young fellow and the bottle breaking halted him. He 
hastily got out and came back to the boys. 

“For goodness’ sake, don’t break the bottles, boys. If you 
don’t want them give them to me. That’s fine stuff, it’s 
worth twelve dollars a quart. Hand them over to me if you 
don’t want them. Some of us could use them.” 

“Nothing doing,” said the boy nearest to whom he 
stretched his hand to take a couple of bottles. “Nothing 
doing, I paid my good money for this and I’m not going to 


136 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

run with a criminal gang. I’m going to get out of it and 
be an American. I’m no personal liberty anarchist. This 
booze may be all right but the law says it’s all wrong and I’m 
with the law. Come on here, every fellow that’s an American 
and is with the law show his colors. And every fellow that’s 
anarchist and is against the constitution show his colors, 
too. We’re either sheep or goats. I’m going to be a sheep 
myself, and be with the law. Come on, boys,” and he led 
the way over to the rock followed by all the young men. 

They were drunk but were getting more sober and had ar¬ 
rived at that condition of obstinacy reached by all drunken 
men at a certain stage of their drunkenness when they arrive 
at conclusions intuitively and with considerable mental acute¬ 
ness and hang on to their conclusions grimly and determinedly. 
Delker saw this and also that it would be dangerous to in¬ 
terfere further for the boys had all taken Big Jim’s side of the 
argument and even his own crowd were now against him. 
The boys made a sort of studied ceremony out of the bottle 
breaking, each one taking turns and breaking one bottle at a 
time. They finished their job thoroughly and turned back to 
the auto. 

“I’m for home and the long sleep,” said the boy who had 
translated Jim’s ideas. “No whiskey picnic around the bay 
for me. I’m some drunk, and when I stand off and look at 
myself I know it. I think Big Jim and his people found it 
out, too. I believe those girls saw we had been drinking. 
We’ve had too much whiskey, boys, we’re all stewed, we all 
got a bun on, we’re all soused, now drive me home, sweet 
home, and let me sleep for ninety-six hours; drive home right 
now and at once, that’s the orders,” and he clambered into 
his seat. 

“All that’s going home get in,” said the driver as he 
started his car. Then he stopped his machine as if he had 
thought of something, looked back and said, “Delker, you 
laid for the kid and made him drunk. It was a dirty trick.” 
He swung his auto around and, followed by the other car with 
the boys in it, started back to the city. 


137 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

Delker watched them for an instant as if undecided, then 
got into his machine and said, “Come on, fellows, we’re for the 
picnic around the bay,” and the last two autos vanished down 
the road as quickly as they came. 

The picnic dinner had been resumed where it had been left 
off. Mrs. Abel had disappeared with Earl asleep in the auto 
beside her, tearful and heartbroken. Her place was filled by 
an assistant in the cook camp. The drinking episode threw a 
glamor over the proceedings but there were too many young 
people there for a lasting effect and affairs gradually at¬ 
tained to normal again. The first table was through and the 
second table succeeded. Then the waiters and cooks joined 
in a union attack on the remains of the dinner. There was 
much visiting and lolling around in the shade and general 
conversation and banter till the dinner finally wound up by 
Jim announcing the sports program to be held on the beach 
on the long stretch of white sand. 

“The tide is going to be out at three o’clock,” he announced 
from a table on which he had climbed. “The sports will be 
on the Clark beach. The sand is firm there. There will be 
races for old men and old women, middle-aged men and 
women, young men and women and boys and girls. There 
will be jumping and vaulting and pole climbing. Every kind 
of athletics will be on our list. The water in the bay there 
will be warm and the little ones can wade out safely on the 
hard sand for six hundred yards and beyond that the swim¬ 
mers can swim. We will give our elderly friends comfortable, 
shady seats of honor. And we will place our friends on the 
cots in places where they can enjoy the balmiest breezes 
from the Pacific Ocean and see everything that goes on. I 
have one more surprise. Later in the evening we will all 
be able to see a real Indian war canoe race. All the Indian 
tribes on the north Pacific coast will be in it. No other 
country in all the world can produce anything like it. It is 
an actual throwback to the days of long ago when this north¬ 
west part of the continent belonged to a dozen different Indian 
tribes and they waged war on each other from Alaska to be- 


i 3 8 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

low the Columbia River in their swift, man-managed war 
canoes that only an Indian can manufacture. No white man 
can make one of these war canoes and this evening we will 
see some of the very canoes that figured in the long-ago 
Indian wars. Now everybody to the beach.” 

The order was obeyed with alacrity by the older folks, 
spontaneously by the children. The beach, the sand, the 
warm water called them and they ran like a bewildering 
flock of leaping lambs down through the grove. Jim had his 
convoy all ready for the old folks and the cripples and they 
were there all arranged before the picnickers who walked 
down had arrived. 

The change from the woods to the beach was a perfect 
one. The woods were enjoyable; the beach was as nearly 
heavenly on that spring afternoon as mortal man can realize. 
The sun was warm, but not too warm. There was a gentle, 
undulating, swaying, entrancing breeze from across the sea. 
It brought the aroma of broad, warm, sunshiny tidal waters. 
It caressed the cheek, it exhaled the balm of health; the old 
men unbuttoned their collars; the elderly women flung their 
hats at their feet; the crippled ones threw their heavier cot 
covers to one side—the god of nature was inviting humanity 
to a banquet of nature’s choicest productions. The bare¬ 
footed children flitted like butterflies up and down and over 
the long stretch of smooth sand. They ran in groups and 
squadrons far out to the water’s edge and waded in the warm 
waves that pulsated so gently. There was no danger, for the 
shallows extended out nearly a mile and there were no deep 
holes, no tide rips, nothing but firm sand and nice, warm, 
clear, clean salt sea water. If there were crabs they were 
friendly fellows and backed away ungracefully but swiftly 
from the white toes of the invaders. Laughter and chatter 
and unrestrained shouts of childish delight came from far and 
near. They could dig in the sand to their heart’s satisfaction; 
they could play any game, sing, dance, the world was theirs. 
Their parents paid no attention to them. They were as safe 
and as free as the humming birds that flashed by them in 


139 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

dozens on wings of gold and silver. It was a child’s paradise. 
Nature had spent a million years forming all the perfections 
of this corner of Puget Sound for the children of Big Jim’s 
Sunday-school classes and this very afternoon, at the end of 
the million years, with sunlight and sun warmth and summer 
air all graduated and controlled for their convenience and 
comfort, the heirs of all the ages swarmed on the sands to 
claim their rights. They were nature’s guests and nature 
was the fairy goddess who provided for every childish wish 
before it was wished. 

There were athletic games all along the beach. A few of the 
main events took a central place. The foot races and the 
jumping and the vaulting were contests on the central sand. 
The amusing features of the men’s and women’s and girls* 
races were many and varied. In the boys’ races the winner 
usually ran just fast enough to win. It was different with 
the girls. They were serious. A big scramble of girls would 
start in a race. There was no order in their running. Some 
were very fast and some very slow. The winner could beat 
her nearest competitor by one quarter or one half the dis¬ 
tance. But she didn’t slow up on that account as a boy 
would have done near the finish. She ran under full steam 
to the very end. 

“Do you notice one thing about the children of all this 
Puget Sound country?” said Grandpa Jones to Grandpa Sel- 
don as they walked around with their canes on the beach. 
“There is no fighting among the children out here and curi¬ 
ous to say there’s no fighting among the grown-ups, either.” 

“That’s true,” said Grandpa Seldon. “I’ve been here 
on Puget Sound thirty years and I’ve never seen a real fist 
fight in this country either between men or boys. Even the 
dogs out here don’t fight and snarl the way they do elsewhere.” 

“It’s in the climate,” returned Grandpa Jones. “There 
are no fist fights and no dog fights. I’ve never seen one here 
either, and I’m a pioneer. Go into Minnesota or Michigan 
or any of these cold in winter and hot in summer climates 
and you see more fist fights in a week than you would see here 


140 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

in fifty years. This climate takes that uncivilized savagery 
out of its people. They have energy to no end but it’s not 
savagery energy.” 

“Another thing,” said Grandpa Seldon, “these kids are 
bigger and stronger for their age than Eastern kids. Look 
at those barefooted girls. They are taller and heavier by far 
than the girls of the same age in the East.” 

“I guess it’s the living among the big trees and in the 
vicinity of the mountains and in a big country generally 
that causes them to grow faster. Eve been here a long time 
but I didn’t come soon enough as it was. As the cowboys 
say: ‘This is God’s country.’” 

“And we’ll try and make these people God’s people,” said 
Jim who happened to be passing the aged pair. 

“Amen to that. We’ll help you,” returned Grandpa Sel¬ 
don. 


CHAPTER X 


T HE Indian canoe races will take place farther up the 
beach where the old wharf is,” shouted an announcer 
through a trumpet as he went along. Everybody 
moved up to the old wharf which was already occupied by 
people who did not belong to the picnic party but who had 
come from far and near to see this special event. 

“Who is that old fellow with the long whiskers? Ed think 
the ocean hurricanes would feel honored to be allowed to 
blow through them,” said Mary. 

“That’s Uncle Joe Kuhn from Port Townsend,” said 
Grandpa Seldon. “He’s master of ceremonies at this race. 
See, he’s all rigged out; new blue uniform, broad brim hat 
and cock eye; but he’s all heart and hospitality. He belongs 
to the good old days in this land when there were no locks on 
doors and the travelers went in and made each house his own 
while he stayed there: the early days on Puget Sound.” 

Grandpa Seldon had taken a commanding position at the 
end of the wharf and as he was a self-elected and enthusiastic 
interpreter of the scene a large group gathered around him. 
“We’re in great luck to-day,” he said. “You see all that 
unloading of pots and kettles on the beach? Joe Kuhn is 
going to have one of his annual clam bakes. That’s what 
brought all these old-timers out. You’ll be in on it if you 
wish to wait and can see a genuine clam bake. These clam 
bakes belong to the good old times, too.” 

“It must have been nice to have lived herein those days,” 
said Mary. 

“Yes, those were the good old days when we were all 
pioneers. This whiskery old Judge Kuhn was as old looking 
the first day he came here as he is now and he came in the 

141 


i 4 2 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

dim, dim, past period. He was here in the Indian trading 
days and can talk Chinook like a Siwash. He began this 
clam bake about the time when the new civilization began to 
thrust the old-timers into the background. It sort of draws 
these old squaw men together. See that old white-whiskered 
fellow? He’s over eighty years old; a real squaw man; 
married a Klootchman, that is, a real squaw; and has a farm 
out on one of the islands away north of here. He’s rich; has 
a family of half-breeds and comes out to civilization once a 
year when Judge Kuhn has his annual clam bake. And 
there’s a whole lot of these grizzled old earthworms in these 
woods on Puget Sound and to-day they’ll collect around the 
clam-bake fires and renew their youth by swapping reminis¬ 
cences.” 

“I suppose they’ll live their lives over again in the next 
forty-eight hours.” 

“Yes, and you watch Judge Kuhn. He’ll be past master 
of all the ceremonies and all this beach will be his domain. 
He’s called Judge because one time in the long distant past, 
nobody knows how long, he was Federal court commissioner. 
Besides being the typical pioneer, Judge Kuhn has also a 
state reputation as a freemason for he’s never missed a 
session of the grand masonic lodge in the state. But we’ll 
see lots of typicals if we look around. They’re all here in 
their war paint and regalia and the Indians, too. I see 
yonder a Siwash tribe from away up in Canada on the 
Fraser River and there’s another canoe from the Oregon 
shore.” 

“And what’s a Siwash in reality?” said Elsie Delaney, a 
new girl from the East. 

“Why, a Siwash is a Siwash,” said Grandpa. “All these 
Indians along the shore from Orgeon to Alaska are Siwashes 
but they’re divided into a whole lot of different tribes, each 
tribe living in its own district, and it’s a curious fact that all 
these different tribes, living close together and of the same 
great family, speak different tongues and they can’t under¬ 
stand each other but they have a common language called 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 143 

‘Chinook’ that every Indian and pioneer white in all the 
country west of the Rocky Mountains understands. That 
word ‘Kla-ha-yeh’ is Chinook, and all these Indians talk 
Chinook as a regular thing. You heard that squaw say that 
word to the other squaw just now.” 

“How did these tribes come to drop their own language?” 

“In the first place, they couldn’t understand each other 
and they had to take up Chinook or something of the sort. 
The Chinook tongue is the very strangest language ever in¬ 
vented. At one time all these coast tribes used what they 
called the Indian sign language. This was not very satis¬ 
factory. No one ever knew how all these different tribal 
languages came to be used by the many tribes of this one 
particular kind of Indian, living in the same country, but 
the lingoes were here and all in use. Then came the white 
trappers and hunters and this added one more tongue to the 
diversity and the general clangor of lingual dissonance. The 
rush to the gold fields of the West added one more element, 
and the white man was imperious and had to be understood 
and it was necessary that the Indians understand him, and 
he hadn’t time to learn forty different languages, especially 
guttural tones, for these Siwash don’t enunciate like we do. 
They talk in their throats. The white man had to trade with 
the Indians and govern them, and so this Chinook jargon 
was made into a language by taking words from different 
languages and inventing others and adding arbitrary pre¬ 
fixes and endings to the words of the different dialects, and 
this new language of several hundred words was made up by 
no one knows who, by common sense, I suppose, and adopted 
by all the coast Indians and white pioneers and became the 
universal tongue. They all understand it: trappers, hunters, 
miners, farmers, Indians, from the mountains to the ocean. 
It has a dictionary now, a tiny little booklet, with all these 
arbitrary words, each one meaning some practical thing or 
idea and these few hundred words permit of a surprising 
fluency although it has no books and literature and has been 
learned altogether by hearing the words spoken. In some 


144 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

instances it has ambitiously edged a strange word into the 
English tongue on the coast. The word ‘cultus,’ meaning a 
ne’er-do-well, is in common use in this part of the country 
and there’s no similar English word that expresses so much, 
for a ‘culms’ Indian is the epitome of all ne’er-do-wellism. 
He’s the grand climax of worthlessness. No other human is 
quite so cultus as a cultus redskin.” 

“Tell us something more of these curious people,” said 
Elsie. 

“Well,” said Grandpa, “you see the different tribes are 
scattered along the beach for miles. The Lummis are in one 
bunch; the Tulalips in another; the Humptulips are off by 
themselves over there; the Laconners occupy a place of honor 
near the center; the Puyallups are near them; the Quillayutes 
are yonder down in the bay by themselves; the Skagits and 
several Fraser River tribes are on hand yonder and the 
various tribes of British Columbia who have journeyed to 
the great event have hauled their canoes up at the distant 
points you see farther along toward Clark’s. 

“These Siwash tribes are not beautiful to look at. They 
are not of the stalwart, tall, robust, highly intelligent, muscular 
men of the plains, who have a Roman profile and brilliant 
black eyes. They’re a different breed. Perhaps at some 
time in the distant past they, too, have been tall and strong 
and lithe and handsome like the tribes of the horsemen 
Indians of the prairies. It may be that at one time they had 
the build of the magnificent Osages or the athletic bronzed 
warriors of the Sioux, with their splendid development of 
muscle and activity that rivalled the best athletes of the 
plains among the whites; but if so they have lost all resem¬ 
blance to the muscular activity and the heritage of hand¬ 
someness that distinguished the aristocratic sons of the 
men who ruled the prairie domain from the Mississippi to 
the Rockies in the days when the buffalo were as grains of 
sand on the sea shore in numbers. 

“These Siwash are all fish Indians. They live by fishing 
and they live largely on fish. They have been used all their 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 145 

days to pulling a canoe around the coast of Puget Sound and 
camping on the shore at night. They never mount a horse 
and they seldom shoot a gun in these later days. They never 
take long tramps in the woods and carry packs of skins home 
to their tepees as the result of a week’s chase of animals that 
are wild and wary and cunning of brain and hard to overcome. 
They have fought the whites in the early days but not with 
that implacable hatred and unyielding Indian patriotism 
that distinguishes the Indian of the plains; that indomitable 
spirit that made him feared and respected by the bravest of 
the brave in the palmy days of Buffalo Bill and General 
Custer. 

“You see they are low and squat. They have great shoul¬ 
ders and short, weak legs. Their shoulders get their great 
strength and breadth from paddling their canoes over Puget 
Sound and the incoming rivers from the time they can make 
a baby paddle in imitation of their elders to the day when they 
lay themselves down to rest in their loved canoes and die from 
sheer old age. They are canoe Indians, and the paddling 
gives the upper part of their bodies a splendid development of 
muscles that are in constant use; like the athlete who de¬ 
votes himself to weight lifting exclusively and grows abnor¬ 
mal bunches of shoulder and back development. Their 
legs have been in these canoes so much that they are almost 
shriveled. In paddling they use the canoe exclusively and 
never row a boat. They know only the short paddle that is 
wielded with a strong, swift sweep of the arm and quickly 
raised out of the water for another stroke. They squat on 
their heels in these canoes and without any exercise in the 
shape of walking and being continually doubled up in the 
position of the tailor sitting crosslegged on the bench, only 
more so, for the Siwash boatman cramps his legs and shuts off 
almost all circulation, these Indians are pygmies from the 
waist down. This is an ideal day for them; a gentle breeze, 
warm sun, peaceful water; a typical Indian day in which they 
can be out without much clothes on along the beach which is 
one of their heritages.” 


146 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

‘‘But they seem to be pretty well civilized!” said Elsie. 

“Oh, yes, the government maintains schools for them at 
different points and the Catholic Church has reached out for 
them and has provided church schools. These people are 
all nominally Catholics for the pioneer priest was their 
greatest friend and he won them to his faith as far as they 
can understand.” 

“I think I can see a certain Indian nobility in them,” said 
Elsie. “They have that Indian reserve and aloofness.” 

“Yes,” said Grandpa, “there’s a certain idealism in their 
air that raises their status to a certain extent, but no fish 
Indian is a noble Indian. There’s a real nobility in the old- 
time plains Indian; the Osage or Cherokee or Sioux; the proud, 
haughty, unconquerable Indian of splendid stature and 
statesman brain who despised white civilization and only 
asked to be let alone in the domains of his ancestors. But the 
Indian that lives on fish loses his nobility of feature and form 
and mind. He’s a degraded Indian. This occasion, how¬ 
ever, brings back something of the old-time appearance and 
habit of thought of these tribes for it is to them the day of a 
great national tournament and the results will be historic. 
It’s a gathering of all the clans and perhaps never again will 
they all meet in such rivalry for the Indian knows he is pass¬ 
ing fast to the cloudland where he will be swallowed up and 
known no more except in tradition. You see each tribe to¬ 
day has brought out its most famous old and well-tried war 
canoes, a sign manual that this is a national event, and a 
victory to-day would be handed down in story to their 
children and their children’s children.” 

“I have been looking at them through this marine glass,” 
said Elsie, “and they’re certainly not either handsome or 
clean.” 

“No, there is no element of handsomeness in their makeup. 
The women have all the bodily faults of the men and some 
more of their own. It’s a man’s privilege to be homely and 
to be ugly if he pleases. It is nobody’s business. But it is 
the prerogative of femininity to be pretty. Beauty of face, 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 147 

' 

figure, expression, or character, is an appanage of womanhood 
and she has not only a right to be beautiful in all or some of 
these respects but has a right to demand of man that she 
be placed in surroundings that will develop these characteris¬ 
tics. The Siwash woman has none of these adventitious aids 
of beauty or grace and she has grown up and developed into a 
very unlovely thing. 

“I think,” said Elsie, “that those big canoes are fine. 
Look how graceful they are in their outline. They remind me 
of the pictures of the big decorated royal barges in our ancient 
history studies. Do they make those canoes themselves ?” 

“Yes, these war canoes you see are real Indian warships. In 
them the Siwash in times past have made swift and silent and 
sometimes terrible forays. They hold more than a dozen 
warriors and they are old, some of them older than the young 
men who are now in them. A real war canoe is a work of 
art and of infinite patience in the making. It is always made 
out of cedar, that being the lightest material known to the 
Indian that has the strength and the wearing qualities. A 
big cedar tree is chosen and cut into the proper length. 
Then the work of fashioning it beings. Bit by bit the heart of 
the old cedar is eaten out by the crude instruments of the 
Indian. This hollowing out is the work of months. It is 
burned out and it is gouged out; the greatest care being taken 
that the center of the tree is not spoiled so that it will spoil 
the canoe that is to emerge from all this process, a perfect 
article of commerce and war and national pride. Very care¬ 
fully the cedar is finished up for this finishing process is an 
art that has been handed down from all the experience of all 
the past in Siwash history and every old Siwash is an author¬ 
ity on how to season and finish a war canoe. 

“This is very precious knowledge and is in possession of the 
seers of the tribe. No white man could have or ever has had 
the patience to acquire this patient art. When the war canoe 
is finished it is a long narrow one, light as an ordinary row¬ 
boat, so light that it can be handled by one man in an emer¬ 
gency and launched for a war party by a squaw from the 


148 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

beach with the greatest ease. It is roomy enough for a war 
party of twenty men and a dozen can work comfortably in it. 
It can skim the water like a bird and all the power it needs to 
drive it is the paddles in the hands of a couple of squaws. 
At the front end is usually a graceful prow, turned out with a 
high degree of skill in the shape cf a swan’s head or some 
other marine design. It is a treasure of great value and of 
pride to the tribe and they value these war canoes above all 
their other earthly possessions. In times of peace, as in 
these later days, they use them for the family conveyance, 
and when they all get in and go to the nearest city to 
do their trading they can put all their purchases in the 
canoe and take them home. They always make these 
family journeys with the tide, and the average Siwash 
Indian knows the tides and the storms better than the 
learned men of the marine schools. When the tide has 
begun to turn in their favor, so that the current will be 
with them and therefore the paddling light, the family will 
embark with their goods and set out for their home many 
miles away. All will row together, and even the little 
children will grasp a paddle and. help out although there is 
no compulsion anywhere either for men or women. It is 
always seemingly a spirit of family unity and agreement by 
instinct. 

“But when these war canoes come into the hands of the 
grown men, as they are now, and they are turned loose on 
the surface of a bay like this, they demonstrate their power. 
They can make them fly along like birds and leave a swirl of 
light foam behind them. They can almost lift them out of 
the water and their rhythmic strokes are in such perfect uni¬ 
son that they seem to move as one great machine. To-day 
the most gorgeous war canoes in all Siwash tribedom are 
hauled on the beach here while around each favorite old 
guard canoe, the tried and true, there are grouped the lesser 
canoes of various sizes and shades of service. It is easy to 
distinguish the favorite big fellows, with the fine prows and 
the deep light construction, that are the center of the tribal 


149 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

possessions on this occasion. The Lummis yonder have the 
most ornate canoe, and it is an object of special veneration 
for it is very light, very old, and very strong and roomy. 
It has been in many a hard-fought contest in the past, both 
in actual hostilities and in the friendly rivalry of past races 
that have become historic.” 

Events had now begun to crystallize the proceedings on the 
beach. Judge Kuhn was master of ceremonies and grand 
marshal of the day. He had washed his face and combed 
out his luxuriant whiskers and brushed his slouch hat and 
tied on a bright new red handkerchief for a tie. He passed 
around among the throngs that were gathering on the beach 
and in the vicinity of the town and gave out the word that the 
head men of the Indians said that the race would come off as 
soon as high tide had been reached as then there would be no 
tide running either way for a short time. The crowd thick¬ 
ened and deepened all along the beach. The Indians began 
stirring. 

The beach suddenly became alive. Twenty big war 
canoes pulled out simultaneously along the shore at different 
points widely separated and began to come slowly toward the 
center where the gathering place had been advertised among 
the Indians by the vigilant master of ceremonies. They came 
slowly to give the women and children, who swarmed along 
the shore like flies in their little canoes, a chance to keep up 
with them till they arrived at the starting point so that no 
member of their families might miss this great event in Siwash 
life. As they came along they were trying their ability as 
canoe men to the utmost and each crew paid the strictest 
attention to the stroke and each Indian essayed to flash his 
paddle in perfect time with the others so that no fraction of 
his strength put in the stroke might be lost. 

They all arrived at the central point and formed a panorama 
of Indian marine display and it was evident that the sight 
stirred the blood of even the stolid old fellows and the 
Klootchmen, as the squaws were called, who gathered with 
the children in the smaller canoes and formed a fringe of the 


150 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

family life of the Siwash tribalism that covered the water for 
a long distance around and lined the beach many deep with 
bronzed humanity in various shades and shapes of dishabille 
and disarray of dress and appearance. The old hags stood 
and peered out of their bleared eyes at the gathering of the 
warriors and in their guttural talk and exclamations to one 
another showed that they had come back to life as of old for a 
moment; and in the eyes of the youngsters of all ages and 
sizes and degrees of intelligence there was that look of silent, 
alert, perfectly quiet expectancy that made up as much 
Indian enthusiasm as any Siwash, young or old, ever per¬ 
mitted himself to show. The Indian onlookers were all 
highly interested yet they were saying no word except here 
and there the sententious exclamations of the Klootchmen 
and the whispers of the children in making their comment on 
what they saw before them. 

The chosen men of all the tribes were in the canoes and it 
looked like a superb lot of humanity to the onlooker for the 
brawny neck and shoulder muscles showed and the long 
sinewy arms that had been developed all these years by un¬ 
ceasing paddling, ofttimes against wind and tide and sometimes 
in the face of storms. The short bow legs were concealed for 
the Indian sat on them as he squatted in the canoe, this being 
one of the marvels of physical training and the results of 
heredity, for no one knows how many hours these Indians 
could sit on their own crossed legs in the canoe and not be¬ 
come deadly cramped in the muscles. To-day they knelt 
down each in his place in the canoe and then sat back on their 
toes and spread out their knees so as to get the good grip that 
was necessary in paddling and to maintain their equilibrium 
and at the same time create as little oscillating motion as 
possible, for every Indian in every canoe knew that team work 
was what counted and that if they would make speed and the 
best time possible each fellow must pull straight ahead and 
not waste any force by an off stroke that would minify his 
own or perhaps nullify some effort of his compaions. He got 
his leverage by his position in the canoe; and it was a wonder- 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 151 

fully solid position he took as his strength of arm and shoulder 
and upper back controlled the straight onward motion of the 
canoe. 

One after another they came up to the starting place, not 
an Indian making a sound. They were alive, though, won¬ 
derfully alive for a band of Siwash. It was clear that the 
strain of love of display that runs through the nature of 
every Indian on earth and shows itself in the spectacular 
prancing of horses, the paint, the waving feathers, the 
statuesque posing and in other ways at different times and 
places, was not wanting in these Siwash warriors. It was 
easily seen that they considered themselves on dress parade 
not only before the whites but their ancient rivals of their 
own tribe. While apparently not deigning to notice the 
effect on the onlookers they were keenly observant and their 
black eyes were full of suppressed fire. 

There were only twelve warriors in each canoe to do the 
paddling but a thirteenth was in the stern, not for the purpose 
of rowing but as a pilot who touched the water here and there 
lightly with his paddle and directed the course so that they 
lost nothing by deviating from a straight line. This under 
ordinary circumstances would not have been necessary as the 
lifetime training made the art of steering instinctive with 
these Indians, but they were taking no chances to-day of 
getting even a yard off the course in this great national event. 
Their coolest headed and most commanding warrior was the 
steersman. 

While waiting for the last of the canoes to reach the center 
a few of them took short, sharp spurts to warm up their blood 
and to get in better shape for the great trial of wind and en¬ 
durance. In five minutes all the canoes were executing 
gyrations in the peaceful waters of the bay that were really 
beautiful. They glided around as light as water fowls and 
with a grace that was infinitely delightful to the onlookers on 
the shore and brought forth exclamations from the women 
and the non-combatants among the Indians who were specta¬ 
tors. Each Indian steersman wore a different colored shirt; 


i 5 2 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

this being arranged and all planned out beforehand so that 
the canoes might be distinguished by the spectators and by 
themselves while the race was going on. None of the con¬ 
testants wore hats, and their other clothing was of the scanti¬ 
est for this was going to be warm work and the afternoon was 
of summer heat. In the graceful practise evolutions there 
was little to choose from among the canoes. That the warriors 
were beginning to get their blood warmed up was evident 
from the intermittent whoops that came from the different 
quarters as they circled here and there in curves like great 
birds. 

The wharf was a vantage point both for seeing the race 
and getting a good view of the Indians themselves on the 
water and on the shore. It was the central point of a vast 
crowd that stretched far on either side; a mixed throng of 
whites, Indians, half-breeds, soldiers, and sailors. There 
were millionaires, poets, dreamers, merchants, farmers, all the 
picnickers, Chinese, Japanese, town folks, country folks, 
lumber men, and mill men and a cosmopolitanism that was 
typical of both the frontier and the marine world. 

Judge Kuhn stood up and, putting the small end of an 
immense horn to his capacious mouth, blew a blast that 
seemed to shake the windows in all the neighborhood. It was 
long drawn out and echoed from all sides and as it died away 
each Indian canoe made a last graceful turn and headed for 
the center. 

They drew up in a semicricle and Judge Kuhn gave out the 
rules of the race. The course was to be half a mile from a 
series of ribbon-covered buoys out in the bay within sight of a 
line stretching directly from the boathouse to yonder cliff 
on the farther side of the bay. It was a line that was easily 
visible and the judges would have no trouble in declaring 
which canoe passed over it first. They were to start at the 
sound of a gun fired behind them and there could be no un¬ 
fairness in that as each one had the same privilege of getting 
under way as quickly as he pleased after the gun was fired. 
Each canoe had to keep its own course to its own buoy which 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 153 

was covered with the same colored ribbons with which its 
starting buoy was bedecked. This was easy, as there would 
be a canoe at each buoy at the end to wave the particular 
colors of the canoe and before starting each would be given 
the privilege of picking out its own particular buoy and thus 
taking its exact course from the start. Any canoe that 
didn’t stick to this regulation or that veered over to the course 
of another canoe would be disqualified and ruled out of the 
race. The prizes were to be a first, second, and a third, in 
money, and the winners were to have a banner of bright 
colors and the finest silk that they might take home with 
them and keep for all time as a record of their achievements 
as canoemen and as the victors in a fair race over all 
their competitors in the fishing waters of the Siwash tribe. 
Each canoe was to be given a banner now with its name 
painted on it and they were to pass up and down along the 
beach in single file so that all the crowd of spectators might 
see who was who and be able to recognize the winners in the 
race. The listening canoes crowded closer as they became 
more interested in the Judge’s Chinook jargon and each sen¬ 
tence was greeted with grunts of approval from the canoes 
and various exclamations of intermittent chatter from the 
Indian women on the beach. 

“I have been more than twenty years among these people 
and there’s more life showing in them at this moment than I 
ever saw before,” said the Judge. “See these little Siwashes 
here with their eyes and mouths wide open and see how those 
old wrinkled hags straighten up and talk to themselves. 
It’s a great day for the Siwash, sure.” 

There was a relaxation as the Judge ceased speaking and 
each canoe proudly grasped the long piece of calicio that had 
its name painted on it in big letters and stretched the cloth 
out from the prow to the stern of their canoe and the parade 
of canoes started past the spectators. It was spectacular 
and interesting. The Indians were on dress parade and they 
enjoyed it as much as the onlookers. As the last canoe passed 
the last big bunch of spectators they all burst into a wild yell 


i 54 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

and the storm of excitement was on. Away they all raced 
like madmen for their places and by the time they had 
reached their stations they were well warmed up for the 
final outcome. 

Judge Kuhn again shouted the rules of the race and as he 
gave the last rule there was a startling interruption to the 
quietude. A stalwart young Indian rose up in the bow of 
the Lummi canoe and in a fierce voice and with a threatening 
attitude, shaking his fist at someone in the Laconner canoe, 
shouted what seemed to be a defiance of some sort. In¬ 
stantly a young man of the Laconner tribe sprang to his feet 
and shaking his fist back at his wordy assailant shouted some¬ 
thing just as fierce in return. There was seemingly intense 
excitement among the Indians and the whites were well 
aware that this was more than just an ordinary happening 
but as it was all in Chinook it was an enigma to them. That 
there was deep and almost uncontrollable passion in the 
voices and the actions of these young men of each tribe 
could easily be seen. Their muscles stood out like cords and 
their eyes fairly blazed while the raucous voices were hoarse 
with the pentup emotion that circumstances restrained and 
controlled. There were guttural exclamations from others 
in the canoes and it looked like trouble of some sort in which 
there would be a general mixup. Judge Kuhn stepped to 
the front and said a word. The Indians turned toward him, 
the two speakers still standing in their threatening attitude. 
The Judge said something more and the two sat down, 
each giving the other a final threatening look that boded no 
good. 

“What is it, Judge?” came from all sides. 

“Nothing except the young man from the Lummi tribe and 
the young man from the Laconner tribe are both after the 
same girl and they want to fight it out here and now,” said 
the Judge. “I have told them that the proper way to settle 
the matter is to let the winner in this race have the girl. 
That would be the way two sports would settle it, isn’t it? 
There she is sitting over there,” continued the Judge, as he 


155 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

pointed to a far more than ordinarily comely Indian maiden 
of about eighteen years sitting on the wharf. “ She’ll be the 
Queen of the clam bake to-night.” 

The canoes were well within clear view as they lined up and 
it was at once seen by everyone that the Lummi and the 
Laconner warriors were side by side on the course nearest 
the spectators. “There’ll be trouble there afterwards,” said 
Judge Kuhn, as he stood on a vantage point and looked the 
situation over. “I can see that the other fellows in the 
canoes are taking up the quarrel of the two young bucks and 
they are apt to have a free-for-all that will last in its results 
for the next fifteen years and kill off a lot of Indians.” 

The Indians made an exciting spectacle when they were 
arranged in one long row with their paddles raised in the air 
waiting for the gunshot that was to start them. To the on¬ 
lookers who were keyed up to a high tension it seemed as if 
the starter would never get ready but he was an old-timer, 
and while these Indians didn’t know what it was to take ad¬ 
vantage of one another in the way of getting their canoes a- 
head of the line or any other of the tricks thatwhite men would 
have indulged in there was a light drifting of the tide and the 
movement of the water and other causes that led to dis¬ 
arrangement and it was several minutes before they were in 
the exact positions that the experienced man at the helm of 
affairs wanted them to be. The Indians themselves in the 
canoes were really the least excited of any of the people at the 
meeting. They had patience as an hereditary gift and al¬ 
though they were at a high nervous and muscular tension 
they were trained to never be in a hurry and they took this 
delay as a matter of course that was part of the game of life 
itself. 

There came a puff of smoke and a report and a shout from 
the shore all along the beach for a long distance both ways 
from the center. “They’re off!” “They’re off!” was an 
involuntary cry from all hands; from men, women, and 
children. 

The rowers themselves were all ready and two hundred and 


156 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

forty broad-bladed paddles struck the water at exactly the 
same instant and the canoes shot forward like things of life. 
They were even from one end to the other. The paddles 
were about four feet long and had a breadth of nine inches at 
the paddle end. They entered the water sideways without a 
ripple and turned broadways as quick as they were submerged; 
then they caught as much force as the full breadth could 
catch and at the very instant of coming out of the water they 
were instinctively turned edgeways again and came out of the 
water as silently as they entered it and without causing a 
ripple. It was the Indian way of paddling and it focussed all 
the power that could be obtained from a certain strength and 
applied force without the least waste of effort and with the 
lightest friction between paddle and water. There was no 
waste of energy when the paddle entered the water; no waste 
when it came out, and when it was in the water it furnished 
all the fulcrum that could be furnished by a paddle of that 
width for the weight and strength of the Indian rower to 
exert his force on. A white man in all his lifetime couldn’t 
learn that delicate adjustment that came natural to these In¬ 
dians although they knew nothing of the how or the why or 
the wherefore of their movements; they only knew that it 
came naturally to them and that it brought results. 

The canoes flew along half the course without even a grunt 
from the rowers; then they caught the excitement of the 
finish and they changed from stoics to the wildness of the 
life of the forest and the stream. Some of the canoes had 
fallen behind and all knew without looking where they stood 
relatively in the race when it was half over. Two of the 
boats were in the lead. They were the Lummis and the La- 
conners. They were as even as they could be; there was no 
perceptible difference between them. The other canoes 
were at various distances behind them, some of them far in the 
rear but still flying along at a tremendous rate, the rowers 
apparently not realizing what it was to be beaten. Every 
canoe was working its full force no matter where it was in the 
race, just as if it expected to be a winner. 




BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 157 

There were short, excited shouts from the head canoes but 
none of the warriors were wasting any breath or effort in 
vain glorying; they knew that every ounce of strength and 
every breath of air was necessary to carry them through?at 
that tremendous clip; faster than they had ever gone before 
in a canoe. The whites along the wharf and shore were wild 
with excitement and cheered the canoes in the lead till they 
were hoarse; women being even more excited and partisan 
than the men. The Indian women caught the spirit and 
jabbered and gesticulated and their eyes were glittering. 
In their jabber could be heard the names of the different 
tribes. 

The race was two thirds over and the sweat was pouring off 
the warriors; not so much from the length of the row as the 
excitement of the contest and the immense physical strain 
that every one of them was put to for the honor of his tribe. 
The two leading canoes were still in the lead so far that they 
were unquestionably the winners and still they were nose and 
nose; the prows, the pride of the tribe, were as even as if a 
line had been drawn from one to the other. Every muscle 
in the bodies of every Indian was strained to its supreme 
tension and every individual was working along with his 
fellows as if each were part of the one machine. It was a 
superb display as the canoes flew over the water. Some of 
the rear ones had fallen so far behind that there could be no 
possible chance for them but still they bent to their work 
as if they were to be first. It added to the spectacular effect 
of the race. Others struggled for second and third place; 
the first prize being irretrievably that of one of the leaders. 

Each steersman in the leading canoes kept his eye on his 
rival boat and encouraged his men. They didn’t shout; they 
gave short, sharp comments and phrases that seemed to be 
the thing that was needed. The finish came in sight—the 
last two hundred yards. Suddenly the steersmen went 
wild; they raised up the paddles in their hands as if they 
would strike down their men; they crouched so as to give the 
least surface for the wind to catch their bodies which might 


158 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

thus slightly retard their canoe; they shouted like maniacs. 
At the first guttural yell from the steersmen the crews also 
went wild. Every man let out a short yell that was seemingly 
only half human and the mighty muscles that were now 
streaming sweat stood out in clear relief on every neck and 
arm and shoulder and back. They dug their paddles into 
the water with a viciousness that had no parallel heretofore. 
Each man was now for himself. They knew that momentum 
was now needed and that each of their brother warriors was 
striking the water with the same demon power and at as 
swift a pace as he could and that there would be unity though 
there was no attempt at agreement as to the time of the 
strokes. The two leading canoes fairly raised out of the 
water and flashed across the line together and went sailing 
far beyond. The others came flying across immediately 
after. 

“A tie, a tie!’’ came from the spectators in all directions 
and the judges said the same thing to each other. ‘‘No man 
could tell which of those canoes was ahead,” said Judge Kuhn 
and his decision was final. 

“The judges decide that it is a tie between Lummi and 
Laconner,” was the tidings that ran along the beach. The 
second place, which would be the third prize, went to a Fraser 
River tribe who were so closely followed by the Tulalips that 
it also seemed to be a tie but the judges, who were at the van¬ 
tage point, gave the decision to the Fraser River Indians, 
something very pleasing to these strangers from afar. 

The canoes rounded to the Judge’s stand and waited for the 
decision. Silently they swept into place, side by side. For 
the time being they had something of the ancient nobility; 
something of the dignity of the genuine Indian manner. 
Their eyes were flashing, their chests were still heaving with 
the tremendous exertion, and their naked bronzed bodies 
were outlined in muscles that dripped wet with perspiration. 
The Indian spirit of the time of along ago was rejuvenated 
and showed in these warriors under the stress and strain of 
this rowing match. 


iS9 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

“Lummi and Laconner is a tie,” said Judge Kuhn from his 
stand, “and these two canoes will have to row a separate 
race to see which will get first prize.” 

There was a murmur from all along the line and it was 
noticeable that the men in these two canoes gripped their 
paddles firmer. A long rolling cheer, intermingled with hand 
clapping, came from up and down the spectators when the 
Judge’s words were repeated. The two canoes quietly- 
slipped from the line and turned toward the starting buoys, 
the slow-moving paddles giving a chance for rest. 

“Aren’t they too tired to row again so soon?” asked Elsie. 
“That must have been awful hard work.” 

“Oh, no,” said the Judge, “they could keep that up for half 
a day. Now this will be a real race. Look at the belle of 
the day, will you? See, she’s standing right at the end of the 
wharf over there and both of the young fellows are waving to 
her. Well, did you ever! See how they are shaking their 
fists and threatening each other.” 

The two canoes came to the starting buoys again and for 
twenty minutes drifted around, the time being allowed for 
a rest. Then theylined up and every log and stump and fence 
and building and boat was utilized by the thoroughly excited 
and far-scattered audience. 

The puff of smoke and the report came again and the 
canoes were lifted off the surface and flew side by side. The 
sun striking the paddles was reflected as from a brilliant 
bird’s wing; the unison was perfect; the natural discipline of 
powerful motion was machine like. Prow abreast prow they 
went flying along; not an inch seemingly was one ahead of the 
other. There were the same short barks from the steersmen 
and at about two hundred yards from the finish as before 
these guiding mentors again shouted that fierce forward-urg¬ 
ing war whoop and raised their paddles over the heads of the 
rowers and crouched with tense muscles, and again the war¬ 
riors dug the broad paddles into the water, each man lifting 
his canoe with every energy of motive power and reserve 
strength that his broad back and iron arms could furnish. 


160 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

It was an even force in potential effects and driving movement 
and the canoes responded alike with a bound, but the god of 
chance was against the Laconners. A paddle in the hands of 
one warrior snapped off at the handle and the blade floated 
away in the tide. There were only a few seconds from that 
fateful break to the finish and the Lummi Indians didn’t know 
of the accident but a thrill ran through the Laconners. In¬ 
tuitively they knew, but the remainder of the crew again des¬ 
perately sank their paddles in the water. The uneven power 
on one side veered the canoe although the steersman had 
divined the danger and exerted all his strength and skill to 
keep it straight. It veered just a trifle and the Lummis swept 
over the line a very slight distance ahead; such a slight dis¬ 
tance that even they didn’t know they were victors, but when 
the observant ones caught sight of the broken paddle handle 
they could guess the result. Again the two canoes turned 
gracefully into line before the Judge’s stand. 

“The Lummis win and get first prize,” said Judge Kuhn. 
“That broken paddle prevented another tie.” Then he said 
the same thing in Chinook. There were grunts of satisfaction 
from some of the canoes and silence in the others as they all 
turned and paddled away. The race was over and the pic¬ 
nickers started back to their place on the beach. 

A short distance down the beach there was a commotion 
that looked like trouble. A body of Indians were gathered 
around a central group who evidently were having an alter¬ 
cation. There was loud talk in Chinook from the muddle 
and more than one was talking at a time while the crowd 
joined in with observations showing that something exciting 
was going on. Old squaws, standing near and far, were mut¬ 
tering to themselves and to each other, and the young Indians 
were keenly observing all that the gathered crowd was doing. 
“They are quarreling over that girl,” said Judge Kuhn, as he 
stopped to listen, “and there’s real angry words being spoken. 
The girl is a Puyallup and she wants to marry the Laconner 
Indian but the Lummis won the race and so she should marry 
their young man. Listen to that; they’re all crowding in and 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 161 

it’ll be a fierce mixup in a minute. See that grizzly old fellow 
raise his paddle? If he strikes the fray will begin at once.” 

There was rough jostling among the Indians already and 
two or three peacemakers tried to keep the belligerent ones 
apart but hot blood was in the ascendent and it seemed as if 
war was imminent. An Indian near the center resented a 
shove with a blow and instantly there was a general wild yell 
and the two bands surged together. Weapons were raised 
and strong arms had already clinched with opponents when a 
slight, elderly man in priest’s garb rushed forward and said 
something in Chinook. The clamor subsided instantly. 
Holds were unloosed and paddles lowered. The priest made 
his way to the middle of the crowd, the Indians parting before 
him. He said something more and the contending parties 
quietly swung apart and began to leave each other. In a 
moment the space was cleared and the uproar ended. 

“That’s Father Boulet,” said Judge Kuhn. “He’s the 
pioneer priest; been among these Indians for thrity years and 
they’re like children in his hands. Now, if you girls look 
you’ll see that here’s the clam beds and here’s spades and 
shovels enough for everybody and she who eats must work. 
Get your spades.” 

“ Does every fellow have to dig her own clams ? ” asked Elsie. 

“That’s the order.” 

“Well, I’ve got my shovel; show me a clam.” 

“Girls,” said Grandpa Seldon. “You see this long stretch 
of tide flats that the tide has just left bare; and you see here 
and there all over it little jets of water, hundreds of them, 
shooting up from the sand about a foot in the air. See how 
the tiny streams glisten in the sun? Every one of those 
streams has a clam at its source; they spout the water up just 
like whales do. Now go ahead and dig your own clams.” 

The picnic girls divided into parties and started out. 
“Here’s one,” said one girl. “I saw him spout out of this 
hole. Now you dig on that side and I’ll dig on this and we’ll 
see what he looks like.” The two dug, carefully at first in 
the soft sand, then with more energy, but no clam was there. 


162 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

“How’s that?” said one of the girls to Grandpa. “There 
wasn’t any clam where this water came up.” 

“Oh, yes, there was,” said Grandpa, “but he dug swifter than 
you did. Now here’s another blow hole and I’ll show you 
how.” He took a 'spade, located the place where the tiny 
stream came from, and quickly sunk the spade as deep down 
as he could just at one side of the hole and threw out the 
spadeful of sand. There was a clam shell tightly closed in the 
shovelful of sand. “You see, girls, he’s closed up now. Ten 
seconds ago he had his shell open down there in the sand. If 
I hadn’t got him out at the first spadeful he’d have dug 
straight down and got away.” 

“But how can a clam dig so fast?” asked Elsie. 

“Well, a clam is quite a machine. You know how a 
monkey swings on the limb of a tree by taking a turn of the 
end of his tail around a limb? Well, a clam digs that very 
way. A clam has a tail four inches long and when you dis¬ 
turb him in the sand, and he can tell you’re there if you move 
his covering the least bit, he scents danger and he pokes his 
tail straight down in the soft sand and when it’s down full 
length he turns about half an inch of the end of it to one 
side in the sand and that gives him a leverage to pull by 
and he closes his sharp shell together and pulls himself by 
his tail down to where it is hooked in the sand and then he 
repeats and down he goes again. He does this so quickly 
time after time that he’ll dig right away from you and dis¬ 
appear while you’re looking for him. Now you try again.” 
Everybody did try and sometimes they got a clam but 
oftener they didn’t, and the exercise and the tantalizing un¬ 
certainty made a pleasurable hour for the many who could 
get shovels. 

Some Indian boys were hired to gather the clams in a sack 
and carry them to the clam-bake grounds, a fine stretch of 
beach with seats made out of logs and whatever material 
nature had piled close by. With a multitude of others who 
had come to the clam bake most of the picnickers chose a cosy 
corner of the beach and sat down to enjoy the dinner of clams 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 163 

and accompaniments. There were pots and pans and kettles 
and dishes and tin cups in profusion and the bill of fare was 
clam chowder and baked clams and fried clams. Judge Kuhn 
had provided for the dinner grounds immense cauldrons, 
tremendous kettles, with a faucet in the lower side. A 
splendid fire was started on a rocky bed and each of the caul¬ 
drons hung over it. Then the thoroughly cleaned clams and 
such seasoning and other materials as the expert chowder 
makers used were thrown into these kettles and in a little while 
there was the most fragrant odor from the steaming tops. 
Far and near the steam odor was wafted and of itself it would 
make hunger. Then the nectar was drawn off in cups and 
bowls and pans and dishes and everybody ate clam chowder— 
a dish that was both meat and drink. There was bread and 
butter and other food but clam chowder more than anything 
else fed the multitude and the big cauldrons were kept going 
full steam up till away on in the morning. 

When the picnickers and their friends had finished their 
second dinner for the day they divided up and wandered 
around among the Indians and pioneers enjoying with keen 
zest the humorous and odd characteristics of these people who 
lived the simple life and scorned fashions’ hypocrisies. The 
courtesy and the friendship of the day seemed so geniune that 
it permeated all the doings and it was nothing uncommon to 
see the men and women of the city and the pioneers from the 
back country around a big log that had some boards nailed 
on the top for a table having the best time they ever had in 
their lives. 

In the middle of the enjoyment Elsie looked up the beach 
from where she and others of the picnickers were located and 
said: “What on earth’s the matter with the Indians?” This 
exclamation was caused by a great uproar farther up the 
beach where the Lummi Indians had their headquarters. 
They were running about most excitedly and calling to one 
another, and the commotion spread among all the other 
tribes and Indians hurried round in all directions and shouted 
Chinook to each other. 


164 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

“What’s the matter, Judge Kuhn?” Mary asked as he 
passed by. 

“Nothing but an Indian elopement. You remember the 
two young Indians that had the quarrel over the girl this 
morning? I tried to get them to settle it by the winner of 
the canoe race taking the girl and it was so agreed by the 
Lummis, who won. But the Laconner boy wasn’t satisfied 
and he and a friend went up town and got a marriage license 
and then he came back and saw the girl secretly and ar¬ 
ranged to elope. It seems she preferred the Laconner fellow. 
Then he played a mean trick. He and the girl had arranged 
to go this evening across yonder to Clark’s and get married 
by a Justice of the Peace. The Lummi fellow had also got a 
license and arranged a great wedding for this evening, think¬ 
ing he had the girl sure for he’d left her with his mother at 
her tepee for safekeeping and he was prepared for a grand 
time. The Laconner fellow got nervous waiting when he 
found out all the arrangements the Lummi crowd was carry¬ 
ing out for the wedding so he and a friend made a sneak on 
the Lummi canoes and hid every paddle they had. Then 
he packed his girl up and flung her in a small canoe and started 
across to Justice Clark’s. You see them halfway over there 
now. The Lummi fellow caught on but the Laconner man 
had got all that start and both he and the girl are pad¬ 
dling and the canoe is flying and they’ll never catch them 
now. See the Lummis have found some paddles and are 
just starting but they’re a mile behind. If the Laconner 
Indian can find the Justice he’ll win easily. It’ll be a pretty 
race. I hope he does win. Nerve like that should have its 
reward.” 

“What will they do if they catch him?” 

“Hard to tell. They’re Indians, and there have been big 
tribal wars over less than this; but they’re not going to catch 
him. You watch and in an hour or two they’ll be back here 
and the Laconner man will have the girl. If they once get 
married the Lummis won’t interfere with them. Even if 
they do get married by the Justice they’ll have to get married 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 165 

again by Father Boulet but they all know the Justice cere¬ 
mony is legal. Keep a lookout for them returning. ,, 

The picnickers were highly interested and their eyes wan¬ 
dered continually in the direction of Clark’s ranch. At last 
they saw a canoe coming and they went up the beach to where 
a great crowd of Indians were gathered. The canoe came in 
and it was the four Lummis who had gone out on the chase. 
They told their story and it was repeated in English by Judge 
Kuhn. They had been too late and the couple had got mar¬ 
ried. Then the Laconner Indian and his new wife appeared, 
both paddling toward their camp away up the beach. Both 
he and she waved their paddles at the Lummis as they passed 
along. Judge Kuhn said something in answer to a question 
by the lovelorn hoodooed swain in Chinook and the fellow’s 
face brightened. After a short talk he jumped in his canoe 
and started toward the Puyallup camp. “I told him the 
girl’s sister was far nicer than she was,” said Judge Kuhn. 
“He wanted to know if the marriage license would be good 
if he married the girl’s sister. He doesn’t want to lose the 
two dollars and a half he paid for it. I told him it would be 
good as he could easily get the name changed in it. I’ll bet 
there will be a double wedding to-night by Father Boulet. 
See, he’s going out to the Laconner camp. Yes, sir. They’re 
shaking hands and there’s the two girls with them. It’s a go, 
all right; two weddings and no Indian war! The comedies of 
life are all around us.” 

The journey home of the picnickers was a straggling pro¬ 
cession. They were a tired but a very contented crowd of 
people and the general expression was that they wanted just 
such a program at their next year’s picnic. 


CHAPTER XI 


I EW DELKER returned home after midnight with his 
crowd from their outdoor carousal around the bay. 
They had gone there to drink whiskey although they 
had pretended to fish more or less. They had some cheese 
and crackers and many bottles. They were sleepy and tired 
and quarrelsome on the way home. 

“Mr. Grotzman in 48 wants to see you, Delker,” said the 
hotel clerk when he entered. “He has been waiting to see 
you all evening, says he is going out in the early morning.” 

Delker made his way to 48 and knocked. A voice said: 
“Come in.” He opened the door and a stranger advanced to 
meet him. “I’m Louis Grotzman, from the East,” he said, 
and offered his hand. “Fve been waiting to see you; take 
this rocking chair. I want to have a little confidential chat 
with you before leaving town and if you don’t object I'll pro¬ 
duce a little of the very choicest to sort of make amends for 
calling you in at this late hour,” and he drew a flask and two 
glasses from his valise and filled them, shoving one across the 
table near him to Delker. “It’s the best old whiskey the 
Middle West could produce in twenty years,” he continued, 
holding his glass up to the light. “If some of our prohibition 
friends would only take a drink or two of that every morning 
and night for a week they wouldn’t be so cantankerous.” 

“It’s good, sure good,” said Delker after taking a sip. 
“We don’t get very much of that out here.” 

“No, but we can get a whole lot of right good whiskey out 
here along this coast if everybody is willing to agree to our 
terms; and they’re liberal, very liberal. What do you think? 
Will they be willing to pay the price for our good stuff or will 
it be hard sledding?” 


166 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 167 

“They would pay any price. They pay the price now for 
rotten moonshine that’s rank poison. People want whiskey; 
they must have whiskey; and if they can’t get real whiskey 
they’ll drink any old thing; nitric acid if it’s labelled whiskey. 
Why, yesterday a bunch of fellows out on a good time couldn’t 
get anything else with a kick in it where they were and they 
chewed up a can of this canned heat to get the alcohol taste 
out of it. They’re in the hospital now and two of them are in 
the morgue.” 

“Well, now, that’s what I want to see you about. I’ve 
been inquiring round and I believe you and I can talk frankly. 
At any rate, I have no time here for diplomacy and now what 
I say to you is between you and me alone. It’s to be con¬ 
fidential for all time. I represent big whiskey interests along 
the Mississippi and to the east of there. Big capital has gone 
into the whiskey business there in the past and it is there yet 
and is going to stay in the game. We can lay whiskey down 
here on the coast at reasonable rates if we have the proper 
connections to handle it at this end. We have our organiza¬ 
tion with its millions behind it at the other end and we need a 
local coast organization out here to put this territory com¬ 
pletely under our dominion. Will you take charge of the local 
organization in this district? We are big people; a million 
dollars is a small amount to us. We deal in big cargoes and 
big money only. We don’t care for the small trade; leave 
that to the moonshiners; a certain amount of them will butt 
in anyway. We are handling hundreds of thousands of 
cases in other parts of the country where we have local or¬ 
ganizations built up through the energy and foresight of 
some individual or individuals who are in with us on the 
profits. Of course we make the main divvy of the swag our 
own because we are the big end of the trade, but there’s 
enough for all of us, and any one who stays with us will be a 
fortune winner without any risk to himself; we protect our 
friends.” 

“Yes. I would be willing to help out here in this district. 
It can be handled successfully here. I know there is a de- 


168 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

mand that will call for large supplies. I can build up the 
organization, and would do it.” 

“Well, then, Til explain in a nutshell the whole game. We 
can furnish it in carload lots. We will run the whiskey that 
comes here from our Eastern and Middle West storehouses 
into Canada in car lots and consign it to a safe place in British 
Columbia; a place from which it can be legally exported from 
Canada on the payment of the Canadian export duty. That's 
all the Canadians care for. If they get their revenue they 
don't care where the whiskey goes. I've seen a small boat 
on Lake Erie loaded with booze and the cargo cleared at the 
custom house for an overseas voyage. That boat couldn't 
have gone to its legal destination any more than I could fly 
without wings right now from here to China. What it did 
do was to strike straight across the lake to an American land¬ 
ing place as soon as it was dark and unload and the next day 
it was back for another load for Cuba or some other point out 
on the Atlantic Ocean, thousands of miles away. 

“When we get the cargoes to their destination north of here 
we can get it across the line in autos or launches. That will 
be the job of the local organization. We will deliver it up in 
British Columbia. Machinery or any other bulky merchan¬ 
dise can be filled around the doors of a car and the body of the 
car filled with whiskey. You know all the customs regula¬ 
tions yourself. The car is sealed when it is loaded and is 
bonded through to here or some other port. You can have a 
set of duplicate customs seals. When our bonded car comes 
across the line the seals can be broken at some convenient 
point that has been agreed on and the whiskey taken out and 
the duplicate seals put on and the car goes ahead to its des¬ 
tination with its machinery. The trainmen will have to be 
seen in most instances but that is easy. If your people are 
familiar with the train stops many times the cargo can be 
taken out of the car without consulting the train crew. 
Usually it is good policy to give them a small share of the 
graft for not looking your way while we work. The whiskey 
can be whirled away in autos or trucks. A coal car is another 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 169 

convenient way of shipping; just bury our cargo in the coal. 
It’s hard to find and hard to get out unless you know just 
where it is. At some siding out in the country the coal car 
can be sidetracked for long enough for our people to get ft out 
and whirl it away.” 

“It calls for a lot of help from railroaders and others.” 

“Exactly, we divide up with anybody and everybody 
from United States senators and representatives down to 
janitors and chimney sweeps; with anybody that can be useful. 
We pay well for good work and the consumer at the very far 
end pays all the bills. We always remember our friends; 
that’s our reputation. If a man can do us a favor and is in a 
position to do so again or even if he isn’t we pay him liberally. 
It pays in dollars and cents to be honest with our people. 
We have a reputation to live up to. Our ethical principles 
are like cast iron for rigidity in this respect. Pay what you 
owe without being asked or dunned is our motto; then make 
the fellow who drinks the whiskey pay all that we pay out 
and a thousand per cent, in addition is another motto that 
we always remember. You know the cost-plus system of the 
war contractors. They took a contract from the government 
to build a ship or a lot of buildings or do some other big work 
for the cost and then ten per cent, above the cost for their 
profit. The more cost they put on, the more expenses they 
piled up, the bigger their ten per cent, was and the greater 
their profit. The graft in the war times for this and other 
kinds of stealing I should think amounted to fifteen billion 
dollars; about one half the war debt. We follow the same 
principle. The more expense we are put to the higher the 
price to the whiskey toper. He pays. We’re honest with 
our people because it pays to be honest in dollars and cents 
and because the other fellow pays our honest bills, anyway. 

“Another thing is this: We often find it easy in places 
where you might naturally expect the hardest traveling. 
Very often a bottle of good whiskey will get favors where a 
bribe would be spurned. This is a peculiarity of human 
nature. I can’t account for it but it is so. It’s surprising 


1 7 o BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

how cheaply the average man can be bribed where it’s only 
passing whiskey along. He doesn’t respect the law itself 
and is willing to help us out for a very little reward. We’ve 
got the sympathy of a whole lot of people who are in favor of 
whiskey or are not actively against it and are willing to do 
what they can for us. A bottle of whiskey goes a long way 
with this class. Always be liberal with the whiskey itself. 
A drink in good fellowship may save a hundred dollars.” 

“It would be expensive work here. Autos and drivers and 
other expenses will be enormous.” 

“Yes, it is expensive, but consider the rewards. There’s 
millions in it. The loss of a high-powered auto that costs five 
thousand dollars doesn’t even figure in the business. A dozen 
of them is just charged up and forgotten. The drivers have 
new ones the next day.” 

“It would take a big organization on the coast in this ter¬ 
ritory.” 

“Yes, and that’s what we want you to handle; to get autos 
and drivers and grease the way among the train crews and all 
along the line. You’ll have lots of expense money allowed. 
Commissions are liberal and you have the chance to lay on 
your own commissions because you are at the local head of the 
machine. We don’t handle beer; it’s too bulky. We don’t 
handle hophead dope of any kind; it’s too dangerous and its 
people are too dangerous. But the best salesmen are hop- 
heads and the best auto drivers and guards for the autos while 
on the road with their loads are the same hopheads. See 
that they have dope and have them depend on you for their 
supply and they’re madmen in action. One of them will put 
his lights out and come down the road on the darkest night at 
sixty miles an hour and think nothing of it. They get there. 
Sometimes there’s a wreck but it’s tacked on the profit and 
forgotten. A bunch of these hopheads can be put on guard of 
a consignment coming down and it will be a daring deputy 
sheriff that will try to take it away from them; they’ll shoot 
on sight; they know no fear. Now what we want you to do is 
to take entire charge of the carloads from the time they come 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 171 

to British Columbia until they reach their destination that we 
have billed them to from some eastern point. If Canada 
annuls its export law, which it may do, we’ll get round it some 
other way. There’s always a way to get whiskey into a 
country. It may be a more expensive way, but what do we 
care for that? The fellow who has a pocket full of money 
and is so thirsty that he will buy this canned heat and chew 
it for the alcohol will pay any price for good bottled brands.” 

“Will this be real good stuff all the time? Can it be de¬ 
pended on?” 

“Absolutely. It’s whiskey that’s now in bond in the ware¬ 
houses in the East mostly; the best there is. It will be with¬ 
drawn from the bonded warehouses legally in an illegal manner 
perhaps. The prohibition law is an illegal law, anyway, 
and if we can meet prohibition on its own ground and beat it 
at its own game we are justified. The end justifies the 
means and the means are always legal and honest and moral 
provided you’re not caught. The illegal and immoral part 
of the game as far as we are concerned is in being caught. 
Don’t be caught and you’ll be an honest bootlegger.” 

“All right,” said Delker, grinning amusedly at the illus¬ 
tration, “your principles are mine. I had adopted them some 
time ago. We’ve all arrived at the same ethical conclusions 
by instinct and without collusion. I’m with you and I’ll 
accept the local leadership and try and make it a great suc¬ 
cess.” 

“ Good enough,” said Grotzman, extending his hand. “ I’ll 
be back here to-morrow afternoon at three and I’ll call at your 
office and we’ll pull down the blinds and fix up all the details. 
You’ve got a man’s job and a prince’s income. You’ll make a 
lifetime fortune in the next twelve months. It’s easy money, 
too. Let me fill up the glasses once more and we’ll adjourn 
till three to-morrow.” 

At five o’clock the next afternoon Grotzman left Delker’s 
office after being there in conference for two hours behind 
locked doors and drawn blinds. Empty whiskey glasses and 
a decanter stood on the table at his departure. They shook 


i 7 2 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

hands at parting and Grotzman had turned to go when he 
wheeled round and stepped back. “Now don’t forget,” he 
said, “that we must win this election. We must have the 
judge, the sheriff, and the county prosecutor. Trade every¬ 
thing for them. Elect our men as auditor and clerk and the 
other county officers if it can be done easily but carry 
the court officers at any cost. We can’t go too strong on 
the judge or they’ll raise the cry that whiskey is dictating the 
judiciary and that would be fatal if it could be proved. The 
average American citizen will not stand for a corrupt judge or 
one that whiskey controls if he knows it for sure. We can 
have a judge or two who will be with us to the extent that he 
is liberal in his views and doesn’t look on every man who takes 
a drink as a criminal; in fact, many of the judges are willing to 
take a gentlemanly drink in a gentlemanly way themselves, 
and we would rather have a church member judge who will 
do that than an out-and-out whiskey advocate. He’s safer 
in close places because his decisions will not be questioned so 
quickly. 

“But we should have a straight-out county attorney and 
sheriff, particularly the sheriff. He’s the fellow who appoints 
the deputies and his deputies will nose around or not nose 
around according to how the sheriff feels on prohibition. We 
can and must have a sheriff who will sidestep and will see 
that his deputies sidestep. We want a sidestepper sure, 
without fail. I’ll have a reliable dope manager, one who 
knows the hopheads all along the coast, get in touch with 
you right away. He’ll wire you some message about ‘fish’ 
and make an appointment to meet you and he’ll put you wise 
all along the line. We don’t handle it under any circum¬ 
stances, but the guys who do use it are very handy and useful 
to us in various ways; we work with them. You can look up 
some of the dope fiends here in the meantime and have them 
spotted so they can be approached without delay. You deal 
with me alone and I’ll deal with you alone in this district; 
all district matters come through you. No one on the 
outside will be recognized by either of us. That’s the only 


173 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

safe way and in your dealings with the local gang follow the 
same principle. Don’t deal with them as a gang. Play 
safe. Now, good-bye again and good luck!” Delker looked 
after him as he walked rapidly toward the hotel. 

“Well, it’s a cold-blooded partnership with the devil him¬ 
self and all his imps are to be included in it later, it seems.” 
He shut the door and poured out a glass of whiskey. “Here’s 
to the boss of hades,” he said, holding up the glass to the light. 
“I’ve sold out body and soul to him for the prospect of good 
American coin. I’m either lucky or unlucky. Who knows ?” 
He drank the whiskey and opened his desk and took a roll 
of currency from it. “And here is the first instalment of my 
Judas agreement. I’ve been wanting to make big money 
quick and I guess I’m going to do it. I’ll make a bunch quick 
and quit. Old money, you’re my best friend. If I get enough 
of your kind I can buy everything on earth that I want. Let 
me see, I guess I’ll not deposit this. I’ll hire a safety-deposit 
box. It can’t be traced there.” For an hour he walked the 
floor and outlined his plan of campaign, jotting down under 
various headings the names of men and women and business 
firms. 


CHAPTER XII 


D O YOU know, Sam,” said Mrs. Abel one evening a 
considerable time after the Sunday-school picnic as 
they sat at the supper table alone, their boy and girl 
and two teacher boarders, Miss Carrie Ganz and Miss Louise 
Hanson, having gone to the church for a practice rehearsal, 
“I really believe that Carrie is in love with Big Jim.” 

“Now what put such a silly notion into your head?” said 
the matter-of-fact husband. “Big Jim is gone, taken for 
good. What on earth would Carrie or any other sensible girl 
do falling in love with him? He’s sentenced for life; a lifer 
they call them in the penitentiary.” 

“I don’t care if he is a lifer. That doesn’t prevent a girl 
from falling in love with him and I know Carrie has.” 

“How do you know it? I haven’t seen any signs of such 
a thing.” 

“Well, she tells me plain enough and tells everyone else 
who can read the sign language. Her actions while in his 
company are all spelled out in that universal language; what 
do you call it, ‘Volapuk’ is it, or ‘Esperanto’ or something 
that everyone can understand.” 

“Oh, it’s her actions that talk, then. That’s the sign 
language.” 

“Yes, her actions talk louder and plainer than any words 
in plain English could. She adores Big Jim and Big Jim 
doesn’t care a cent for her. Perhaps that is putting it too 
strong for Big Jim is good-hearted and treats all the girls very 
nice and thinks Carrie is a very nice girl and treats her that 
way, but he’s not in love with her by any means; not even a 
little bit.” 

“Well, I don’t know anything about this pernickity love 
i74 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 175 

business. I can’t understand love in Esperanto or in English. 
I wouldn’t know what it was even if a Chinaman jabbered it 
to me. I’ll bet you a new hat you’re mistaken in your Es¬ 
peranto translation of Carrie’s actions. She has been here 
now two years and I never saw a more sensible girl.” 

“I’ll take the bet, Sam, and I’ll choose that little gem of a 
hat in the lower left-hand corner of the millinery window of 
the big department store. It’s marked thirty-two dollars 
but perhaps you can beat the milliner down to thirty-one 
ninety-five. I know I’m right. I know Carrie has been here 
two years and is the most sensible girl in the world, but what 
has love to do with common sense? Who ever heard of love 
and common sense going into partnership ? Why, didn’t the 
widow across the road last week give up her salary of two 
hundred dollars a month in the city and marry that big, 
homely, pockmarked, awkward, financially broke numbskull 
of a carpenter and she’s as pretty as a picture and could have 
had her pick and choice. I could have chosen a thousand 
times better for her than she chose for herself.” 

“You could!” and Mr. Abel laughed derisively. 

“Yes, I could. Common sense and love are no relations. 
They’re not even on speaking terms. They didn’t ever have 
an introduction. Carrie has thrown common sense to the 
winds and fallen so violently in love with Jim that I’m afraid 
of trouble of some sort. She doesn’t tell her friends about it 
but I’ve seen her stand in the crowd around Big Jim—there’s 
always a crowd around him, a crowd of women if he’s where 
there’s more than one of them—and I’ve seen her look up to 
him with that adoring look of perfect trust that only a girl 
that’s too far gone to be recalled to sanity can show. It’s a 
luminous glow that can’t be faked or assumed or actressed on 
the stage. It’s a woman’s soul shining like starlight in her 
eyes and it means love, absolute love of the insane kind, com¬ 
plete love, overpowering love. If Big Jim were taken out of 
this world to-night Carrie wouldn’t want to live another day. 
Big Jim is her world.” 

“Well, I hope you’re mistaken. I’m sorry for the little 


176 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

girl if it’s that bad, but even at that it won't be permanent. 
We can sort of keep our eyes open and guide the girl away for 
the holidays and she may forget. Time is a wonder worker, 
you know.” 

“Yes, I know, but I'm afraid. However, here they all 
come, all romping but Carrie. I'll have to do something to 
waken her up to her danger.” 

A few evenings after this conversation Doctor Partridge, 
the druggist at the road junction near by, called Mrs. Abel 
on the 'phone. “Can I speak to you, Mrs. Abel, about a 
matter of some importance?” he said. “I would like to see 
you personally if possible.” 

“Certainly,” she said as a vague fear of something wrong 
came to her. “I’ll be down your way in half an hour and will 
stop.” 

She found Doctor Partridge alone in his drug store. He 
was an elderly man who had practiced medicine in the East 
and had come West for his health more than anything else 
and had started the drug store here from force of habit. It 
gave him an occupation as he wanted to get away from the 
work and worry of the practice of medicine. He had money 
enough. All he wanted was something to do to occupy his 
mind in the line of his life work. “Come in here,” he said to 
Mrs. Abel and led the way to his study. “ I’ve got something 
to say that is very confidential and you’re the only person I 
would mention it to. Miss Carrie Ganz has been at your 
home for a long time and it’s in regard to her that I wish to 
speak. I’ll relate all the circumstances and you can then see 
why I wished to talk to you. Perhaps I had no need to do so 
but I think I am justified seeing that you are the only person 
I am going to talk to. 

“Last evening Miss Ganz came into the store and bought 
some trifles. I noticed, or thought I noticed, that she was 
acting and talking in a vague and somewhat unnatural man¬ 
ner for she usually is direct and straightforward and like most 
teachers rather decided as to what she wants. There were 
other customers in and she lingered till they were gone, either 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 177 

through design or accident, when she turned the conversation 
to the subject of morphine and wanted to know various things 
about its properties and effects on people to whom it is given. 
She was especially insistent on knowing the exact amount 
that could be given safely to a person at a time and eventually 
wanted to buy some saying that at times lately she had much 
trouble in getting to sleep and thought she could use a little 
to advantage. She did not consult me as a physician but 
simply wanted this information from me as a druggist so 
that I do not feel that there was anything of a professional 
confidence between us and therefore I am divulging it thus 
far. I asked her how much she might want and to my sur¬ 
prise she named an amount that would be highly dangerous. 
I mentioned the fact that this was a large amount and care 
would have to be taken in its use. She assured me she would 
use great caution but she wanted to have some on hand. I 
then explained to her the impossibility of me selling morphine 
to her direct on account of the strict narcotic law and sug¬ 
gested that she call on Doctor Armstrong. To this she rather 
demurred and abruptly left the store. Certain phases of 
action and talk during the conversation aroused my sus¬ 
picions as to her motives and I felt it to be my duty to call you 
and tell you all about the incident. I debated the matter 
over and over again and finally concluded to do so when I saw 
her go to the city this forenoon and return home. There are 
times in this world, you know, when a little forethought may 
save a world of trouble.” 

“I’m glad you called me,” said Mrs. Abel who then related 
the details of what she believed to be Miss Ganz’s infatuation 
for Big Jim Albright. The doctor listened to her to the end. 

“And does Jim know anything of her feelings toward him ?” 
he asked. 

“I suppose he has noticed it more or less at times. I think 
he avoided her now and then but I believe he does not look 
on it as anything serious and probably does not think of it 
at all. I am inclined to believe myself that the girl is dis¬ 
traught and probably has been sleepless and that the nervous 


178 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

tension has worn her out and she might do almost anything. 
Could she get morphine in the city? ,, 

“Oh, yes; with her knowledge of the subject she un¬ 
doubtedly could get it or other poisons. I’m glad now I told 
you. My suspicions were well founded. It may be a case of 
temporary mental aberration, and a little common-sense 
watchfulness is to be commended. If I can be of any help 
to you call me up at any time.” 

Mrs. Abel went home in a very thoughtful mood. She was 
a woman of much worldly experience and knew as well as 
any one can know the unknowable subject of the moods and 
erratic mental illogic of girls in general. 

She found that Carrie and Louise had gone out to visit for 
the evening with some of their pupils a mile away and felt re¬ 
lieved at the thought. Carrie would undoubtedly forget all 
her own troubles in the company of a lively bunch of young 
people such as she was with. But she found she was vaguely 
concerned. She could not get off her mind what the doctor 
had told her. She knew he had not told her all for it took 
strong reasons to drive him to call her up and tell her anything 
for he was a very conservative old gentleman in such things. 
She busied herself and stayed up till the young people arrived 
home. Louise came into the kitchen as usual for a glass of 
milk but Carrie went directly to her room. “Carrie has a 
headache,” said Louise in explanation. 

Mrs. Abel still busied herself and could not make up her 
mind to retire. The thought kept forcing itself on her mind 
that there might be something wrong that she could rectify 
by watchfulness. At last she made up her mind firmly that 
she would find out and settle the matter. It had got on her 
nerves. It was now nearly one o’clock and she was as wide 
awake as she was in the early morning. Everyone else in the 
house had been asleep long ago. She took a glass of milk 
and went on tiptoe to Carrie’s room. The transom was closed 
over the door but the light inside was burning. She knocked 
lightly. There was no answer. Again she knocked. No 
answer. She tried the door. It was locked but the key on 


179 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

the inside fell out when she turned the knob. There was no 
sound from the inside when the key rattled down on the floor 
and swiftly she took her master key and gently unlocked the 
door and opened it enough to get a look inside. Carrie was 
not in bed and heavy breathing reached the ears of Mrs. Abel. 
She opened the door wider and her heart stopped beating. 
Carrie sat in the rocking chair by the table. She had taken 
off her coat and hat and her shoes were unbuttoned. The 
chair arms evidently held her up as she leaned limply to one 
side, her head drooping over. She was in a deep sleep. Be¬ 
side her arm on the table was a book and a bottle, empty ex¬ 
cept for a small amount of dark liquid in the bottom. The 
cork lay beside the empty bottle. There was a dark stain 
on the girl’s lips. Mrs. Abel took up the bottle with shaking 
hand. It was labelled “laudanum” and was from a leading 
city drug store. 

She grasped the girl’s arm and shook her. No response. 
In desperation she laid down the bottle and with both of her 
strong arms shook the girl again. She showed not a sign of 
awakening and continued her heavy, deep, labored breathing; 
a sleep of unnatural degree as if the girl were working at sleep- 
ing. 

Mrs. Abel turned quickly and went to the telephone in the 
kitchen and called Doctor Partridge. “It’s Mrs. Abel. Can 
you come over in reference to the matter we were talking 
about this afternoon?” The doctor understood that she was 
thus talking to cover up some situation from the operator or 
others who might happen to be on the line. 

“Oh, yes! I can come now as well as any time if it’s 
necessary.” 

“All right, we expect you then in five minutes and say, 
laudanum is the missing word.” 

“That’s easy understood. You can depend on me. I’ll 
be there in five minutes.” 

Mrs. Abel returned to Carrie’s room, took the empty bottle, 
put it in her pocket, wiped the stain off Carrie’s lips as much 
as possible, and wakened Louise in the next room. Fortu- 


180 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

nately for her the rooms occupied by the two girls were off by 
themselves and no one else was disturbed as yet. “Get up, 
Louise, and help me,” said Mrs. Abel, “Carrie has had a 
fainting spell and I need your help. Now be brave. It’s 
nothing much and we can do everything ourselves without 
calling on the others. IVe already sent for Doctor Partridge 
and he’ll be here in five minutes.” 

Louise was scared to a pallor but quickly set to work under 
Mrs. Abel’s directions. “She evidently became unconscious 
and couldn’t get into bed. I’m not sure whether she should 
be left in an upright position or not but Doctor Partridge will 
know. Here, you sit here and hold her in the chair while I 
let him in.” She met the doctor at the door and showed him 
the bottle. “On the table beside her in the bedroom, empty,” 
she said. “She went to her room late, about eleven I think, 
and I found her at one-fifteen sitting in her rocker in the very 
deepest sleep. I couldn’t awaken her. She hadn’t un¬ 
dressed but her shoes were unbuttoned so she must have taken 
this shortly after she went to her room and sat in the chair till 
she fell asleep.” 

The doctor looked at the label and the bottle’s size and 
shook his head. “No one knows?” he asked inquiringly. 
“No one but you and me. It’s a fight with the odds against 
us. I’ve everything here. I understood your ’phone call 
exactly and had my emergency kit packed as usual and threw 
the accessories needed together and we’ll do what may be 
done without loss of time.” 

Till the gray dawn life and death battled in that room. 
Medical knowledge, medical technique, and medical skill and 
unwearied watchfulness and labor at high nervous tension 
fought the grim reaper and won, just won, and that was all. 
“She will recover, but it will be a severe shock,” said the doc¬ 
tor as he sank into an armchair at daylight and directed Mr. 
Abel and Fred Garner, one of the farm hands, in marching 
Carrie up and down the hallway, the two supporting the 
dazed girl between them and keeping her marching and shaken 
up to prevent the strong grip of the drowsiness from again 



BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 181 

carrying her back to the deep sleep stupor. The men had to 
be called in and four of them worked in relays and kept her 
on the go while the doctor and Mrs. Abel and Louise and the 
other women who had been called did their part as the doctor 
divined it should be done. 

That afternoon Carrie lay propped up in bed, the tiredest 
girl in the state. By the next afternoon she was rested from 
the worn-out condition of the day before and was talking more 
or less. “No one knows but Doctor Partridge and myself,” 
whispered Mrs. Abel to her, “and no one ever will know un¬ 
less you tell yourself.” 

The girl threw her arms around Mrs. Abel’s neck and cried 
like a child. “I’m so weak and so foolish and you’ve been 
like my own mother to me,” she sobbed. 

“There, now, don’t worry over what’s past. We’re all 
weak and some of us are tried more than others. Now just 
lie down and rest and quit thinking. All’s well and will be 
well in the end. Now don’t talk and don’t think.” Carrie 
closed her eyes and followed the suggestion and went quietly 
to sleep. 

Her illness was an event of the neighborhood for she was a 
well-known teacher and the pupils and school patrons came 
trooping in to see her with flowers and all sorts of remem¬ 
brances. Her secret was well guarded and the doctor hinted 
in answer to questions about high blood pressure and an 
unconscious spell and that version of the incident passed 
current. 

A week went by. “I’m getting sort of discouraged about 
Miss Carrie’s case,” Doctor Partridge said to Mrs. Abel one 
day. “She recovered all right but she doesn’t recover. She 
doesn’t gain up and get strong. Her case now is mental and 
not physical. We’ll have to do something.” 

“Perhaps a change of scene and climate would restore her,” 
said Mrs. Abel. “A California trip might work wonders.” 

“It might. I’ll advise that.” 

The next afternoon Mary came in to see Carrie. She had 
been one of the most frequent visitors and Mrs. Abel and she 


182 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

were the only ones left out of the constant stream of callers 
during the afternoon. To Mrs. Abel Carrie seemed to take 
fits of depression at times and this was one of those afternoons. 
Mary was sitting beside her and also noticed the sadness and 
weariness of her face. “Let me raise your head, Carrie, just 
a little. Pll straighten that pillow.” She did so and some¬ 
thing dropped to the floor from under the pillow. She 
stooped to pick it up and restore it to the place from which it 
had fallen. As she brought her hand up she could not help 
noticing what it was. It was Jim’s photograph. Carrie saw 
it at the same time and quickly grasped it from her hand 
and covered it with both hers as a crimson flush overspread 
her face and neck. Then in an instant she burst into tears 
and her face grew pale. The incident and action was a rev¬ 
elation to Mary. It was as plain as if everything were out¬ 
lined in writing before her. 

Again the deep flush came back to the pallid face and the 
girl’s eyes flamed bright through hot tears as she said de¬ 
terminedly: “Yes, I loved him and I love him now better than 
life itself. I love him and I can’t help it. I took poison and 
tried to kill myself and end it all because I love him. I was 
crazy in my woman’s love. I was so crazy I dreamt once at 
the picnic of killing you so I might have a chance to win him. 
I was crazy, crazy, crazy! I have watched for him every 
day. When I could see him even pass along the road that 
day was sunshine. If I missed seeing him the whole day was 
gloom and cloud. I’ve stood near by at church and Sunday- 
school and lost consciousness because he was there close by. 
I felt a thrill of perfect happiness if I could be near enough to 
touch the sleeve of his coat. Your Jim was the sun of my life 
and when he was not near my life was all dark, black as 
blackest midnight. I love him as no woman ever loved a 
man before. I want to die loving him.” The nerve tension 
collapsed and she sank back on the pillow in a flood of tears. 

Mary put her arm under her head and smoothed her hair 
and placed her cool hand on the hot brow. “There, now, 
don’t be so discouraged with life. You’re weak and worn 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 183 

and will see things different next week when you get strong. 
I don’t blame you for loving Jim. I love him myself.” 

“And you don’t despise and hate me, then,” said Carrie, 
grasping Mary’s hand nervously with both of hers. “You 
don’t hate me for my crazy love and crazy actions?” 

“No, indeed. I don’t despise nor hate you and I’m going 
to help nurse you back to health and strength. You’re physi¬ 
cally weak now but in a week or two you’ll be strong again and 
I’m going to have Jim come in and see you to-morrow fore¬ 
noon at eleven.” 

“Oh, will you ? Will he come here and will I see him ?” and 
the incredulous look and heightened color was accompanied 
by a still tighter grasp of Mary’s hand. 

“Yes, he’ll come sure at eleven and I’ll come with him and 
we’ll come every day till you get strong.” 

“Well!” and the girl sank back again on the pillow and 
closed her eyes. “I thank God I’m still alive then.” 

“And now,” said Mary gently, “we’ll pray to God and ask 
His guidance and the comfort of His presence for we can only 
find happiness by trusting in Him,” and kneeling down with 
Mrs. Abel, who had been a tearful spectator of the extraordi¬ 
nary scene, Mary prayed to God that His grace might fill their 
lives; that His helping hand might be extended to all the weak 
and unfortunate ones of earth and strengthen them in regu¬ 
lating their lives by the teachings of the Savior of men so that 
they would find perfect peace on earth and attain salvation at 
the foot of the Throne through Christ the Redeemer. It 
was a woman’s personal and direct prayer to God for strength 
and when she had finished Carrie joined in a fervent “amen” 
and whispered: “I feel stronger now.” 

The next morning at eleven Jim and Mary drove up and 
came in. Mrs. Abel had so arranged that no one else was 
present. Carrie had changed for the better physically after 
Mary’s visit. She talked hopefully and cheerfully with Mrs. 
Abel through the evening and had a good night’s sleep, some¬ 
thing that she had not been able to enjoy for a long time. 
She spent the morning in preparing for her visitors and al- 


184 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

though highly nervous was bright and jubilant. Jim and 
Mary went direct to her room in a matter-of-fact way. Mary 
greeted her first and Jim came forward and extended his 
hand. “Fm sorry to see you so much under the weather, 
Miss Ganz,” he said. “However, I believe I’ll take that 
back since I have seen you. They told me you were an in¬ 
valid and really I don’t think I ever saw you look better in 
my life. It’s only a few of us can wear a society look when 
we’re in the hospital.” The ice of constraint was broken. 
Carrie had grasped Jim’s big hand in both of hers and held on 
to it rather longer than the usual handshaking period and was 
so nervous that she might have gone to pieces but Jim’s ban¬ 
ter set them all laughing and he had told her the very thing 
she most wished to hear: that she looked good to him. In a 
minute the four people were joking and laughing and really 
enjoying the visit. There wasn’t a word spoken that had any 
bearing on the cause of Carrie’s illness and when Jim and 
Mary left, promising to come in at the same time to-morrow, 
the downcast girl of a few hours before had changed to her old 
self. 

Doctor Partridge came in later. When he left he stopped 
for a cup of tea in the kitchen with Mrs. Abel and a neighbor. 
“What has happened?” he asked. “This is a different pa¬ 
tient to-day from she was yesterday.” Mrs. Abel told him of 
Jim’s visit. “ So, so,” said the doctor. “ It’s a case of mental 
controlling physical. You know we call these nervous cases 
but I have my own theory that the nervous system is secondary 
in all such cases and that the main criminals are really the 
ductless glands. A strange thing about these so-called ner¬ 
vous disorders is that we don’t find any lesion of the nerves 
themselves which would probably be one of the facts found 
out if the nerves were the ones to blame altogether. There 
are half a dozen of these ductless glands and we are just be¬ 
ginning to learn that they control growth and health and hap¬ 
piness and life itself far beyond anything we ever imagined. 
I believe in twenty years from now the medical world will be 
treating these so-called nervous disease manifestations not as 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 185 

nervous problems but as perversions of the healthy influences 
of the ductless glands. The nerves may be an active agent 
but the ductless glands will be looked on as the first cause and 
the problem will be to restore the healthy influence they exert 
normally instead of allowing them to exert the perverted in¬ 
fluence that some outside cause has endowed them with power 
to use for the time being. I feel that I am living too early. 

“I wish I could come back in the years to come after in¬ 
vestigators have completed and outlined a program of the 
ductless gland influences on the human body and mind from a 
strictly medical standpoint. I prophesy medical practice is 
on the eve of being completely overturned in many of its 
main respects, that it will be proven that these insignificant 
in size little ductless glands are the real overlords of the physi¬ 
cal and mental entities called the individual’s body and mind. 
It may be that the majority of human ailments will be treated 
by treating these at present mysterious actors in the health 
tragedies of the lives of the men and women around us.” 

“You think there was some outside cause in this case?” 
said Mrs. Abel. 

“Certainly, suppression or repression of the natural play of 
mental activity. The girl loves; the love is suppressed be¬ 
cause the regulations that superior wisdom has made for the 
safety of society demands its suppression. It’s not the love it¬ 
self that does the physical and mental damage; it’s the sup¬ 
pression of it in deference to the imperious commands of 
civilization’s binding unwritten law.” 

“Don’t you think that the social laws that you speak of are 
being flouted more and more by certain classes of our Ameri¬ 
cans?” said Mrs. Abel. 

“Undoubtedly there is a relaxing in some quarters, espe¬ 
cially under the war stimulus, but the general suppression is 
still carried out among the bulk of the people. Economic, 
educational, and social conditions largely cause the sup¬ 
pression of natural emotional tendencies to-day. Couples are 
not getting married till late in life because of various reasons 
and love between young people, conjugal love, maternal and 


i86 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

paternal love are being suppressed and repressed out of our 
lives by outside causes and this multiplies by many fold our 
physical and mental ills. It would be a happy day for this 
nation if every man were married at twenty-one and every 
woman at eighteen.” 

“But how would they live? How could a young man pre¬ 
pare for life by the time he is twenty-one? How could he 
get an education or business training or provide a home? 
And how could a girl get through college or get ready for the 
responsibilities of married life at eighteen?” 

“A fig for these excuses. I am stating as a medical practi¬ 
tioner of forty years that the suppression of the matrimonial 
and conjugal emotions in America are more detrimental to 
our nationality and our scheme of civilization than all the 
drawbacks in your query would be. These natural emo¬ 
tions are jammed down and held down by our economic and 
social conditions like a cotton press jams down and holds 
down a bale of cotton. Matrimony is the natural condition 
for young people and you can’t repress and suppress nature 
for any length of time and not hear from nature. We doc¬ 
tors are hearing from nature. This America is becoming a 
great big neurasthenic factory and we know the cause.” 

“It seems impossible for a couple to be married at twenty- 
one now and make a success of life.” 

“That depends on what you call success. A boy or girl 
who chases after a career can’t; but why chase a career? The 
actress who goes it alone because she is forced so to do or of her 
own free will works and slaves and drills and rehearses and 
changes night into day and day into night and hurries hither 
and thither over the surface of the earth, existing among 
strangers, not living, may have applause and dollars and cents 
and headline notices when she is forty-five; and all of these 
are as apples of the city incinerated by God’s wrath, filled with 
the ashes of a great delusion. And when she finds it all out 
it is too late. She would have had ten times more real hap¬ 
piness as the wife of an upright, manly, respected, ordinary 
citizen of the world whom she could love and respect; more 



BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 187 

of a thrill out of listening to the gurgle of her first baby in 
trying to say mama and dada than she has out of the most 
tumultuous greeting that grand opera gives its favorite star; 
and her life as the caretaker of three splendid boys and three 
attractive girls from babyhood to manhood and womanhood 
would be a greater success in the sight of God and man and in 
her own sight, too, after she finds it all out, than it would be as 
a spinster grand opera star wearing a flowing gown and a 
bedizened crown singing carols in a language her hearers don’t 
understand. Success? What is success, anyway?” 

“Many people would hesitate to agree with you, doctor,” 
laughed Mrs. Abel. 

“I know they would, but I know also I am right because I 
see the national neurasthenic factory at work. Success is 
happiness and happiness is success. There is only one source 
of perfect happiness on this earth. It’s the love of the one 
man for the one woman and the love of the one woman for the 
one man, each mutually attracted, a perfect love on the plane 
of the highest civilization: it’s the love of mother for child 
and child for mother; of father for child and child for father; 
of each member of the family group for each other member 
and for all the members as they cluster around the radiant 
home hearth; that is perfect happiness; and there is no other. 
The love that lights the home is the only source of happiness; 
it is the purest gold. All other alleged sources of happiness 
are alloyed; base metals are in their makeup. To achieve the 
perfect home illumined by the perfect love is success in life. 
All other successes are counterfeit. American young people 
are chasing counterfeit successes. They are chasing careers; 
and their situation is growing more complex, more dangerous. 
They are being forced away from real homes lighted by real 
love. Where it will end I know not but I do know why it 
should end.” 

“Our educational institutions don’t carry out your idea, 
doctor.” 

“No, they set the boy or girl chasing a career. The money¬ 
making career is the standard of success in life. The building 


i88 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

of the perfect family home should be the standard and is the 
real standard, no matter what standard the schools and the 
world set up. Nature has been forging mental and physical 
tendencies in humanity into instincts since creation. These 
instincts are suppressed by chasing careers and irreparable 
mental and physical damage is being done; multitudinous ills 
and ailments, often obscure but directly traceable to the one 
cause, are being put up to the medical man. If the young 
men and women of the United States to-day were to organize 
into one grand army of perfectly mated couples, twenty-one 
and eighteen years old, and make a beginning in building 
happy homes where love reigned, before the next generation 
was grown up nine tenths of these ailments that maintain 
these battalions of us doctors and this great collection of 
hospital buildings would disappear. The homes would 
annihilate the plagues that are here and are swooping down 
on us in new brigades like evil birds of prey. But it won’t be 
done because humanity has adopted a false, a fatally false 
standard of success. Money, fame, power, the applause of 
the stage or forum, the glitter of the career; these are not suc¬ 
cess; but they are recognized as success. The home where 
love reigns; that is success; and there is no other. But that 
does not get us anywhere in this case which is one of the anom¬ 
alies arising partly from our program of regulations for the 
welfare of society in general. We must get Miss Ganz away 
from here, from all this environment for a considerable time. 
I have told her she must go to the hospital in the city for a 
week or two; that there she can be taken care of by trained 
nurses and be restored to health and strength in a much 
shorter time.” 

“That’s exactly what we were thinking of,” said Mrs. Abel. 
“She’s a stenographer and we can get her a position in the 
city. It may be we have found the one way out of this com¬ 
plicated situation.” 

“Yes, and we’re really lucky in this case. It demonstrates 
how little we wise people really know. We don’t know what 
this thing called love is. We do know that there are millions 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 189 

of people who go through life and never experience love. 
Some of them are incapable of loving. They haven’t the 
faculty of love in their brain. But others love and here is a 
case where this thing called love affects the individual’s mental 
and physical health, but how and why? We know not.” 

“And how about jealousy, doctor?” 

“We don’t know. We only suppose it’s some perversion of 
some part of the brain functions. We know that jealousy 
is a very real condition that does exist and is highly dangerous. 
There are worlds around us that we know nothing of except 
that we know some of them exist. I am an old man and I 
have arrived at the conclusion that I know no real knowledge. 
What I do know is not knowledge at all. It’s just the experi¬ 
ence of countless ancestors passed down to me without reason 
or explanation. Our definitions of what we call our knowl¬ 
edge are just parrot talk made up to please ourselves and de¬ 
lude ourselves into the belief that we know things when we 
don’t know anything about them. I can define love and 
hatred and jealousy and life and death and growth and decay 
and electricity and music and speech and all my definitions 
are just so much gibberish. I know really nothing of the sub¬ 
jects I define so glibly. 

“ I can define speech and I say to myself I know what speech 
is and then I speak and you hear and understand; but how 
and why? Any explanation I can give of how and why is just 
stupidity covering up stupidness. I don’t know even one 
little hint of how or why; not even a hint of the beginning of 
how or why. 

“We know that material experiences have come to us in re¬ 
sults from past generations and we realize the results and 
some great inventors and investigators like Edison and Bell 
have enlarged the scope and direction of these results, but no 
inventor or investigator has invented or discovered any real 
knowledge. Edison went outside the boundaries of the in¬ 
heritance of the past and gave us an enlarged result, the ma¬ 
terial incandescent light, but he didn’t add one iota to our 
knowledge of what electricity is. Bell went beyond the previ- 


190 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

ous experiences and gave us a new result, the telephone, but 
he didn’t add one little hint of the what and the how of the 
transmission of speech. I speak and Bell hears. Bell the 
inventor of the telephone is as ignorant as the Hottentot 
savage of the how and the why. 

“Other inventors gave us pianos and organs; in results far 
beyond the results of the past; but they didn’t give us even a 
glimpse or hint of real knowledge; of the how or why of the 
music their pianos tinkled out; of how it comes to pass that 
one individual can strike the lifeless ivory keys in certain 
ways and the chords of rhythmic sound reach other mysterious 
chords of suggestion in the soul of the listener away in the dis¬ 
tance and thrills and influences and enchants. All the how 
and why, all the real knowledge above and below and around 
and in us is locked up and the unfindable key is lost in the 
unexplorable vistas of infinity. I’m an old man and I’m dis¬ 
couraged when I realize that this humanity in this age of so- 
called enlightenment knows nothing except the outside of the 
results of material experiences. But I guess I’ll just plod on, 
plod on, because it’s instinct in me to plod on. And now 
after this soothing teafest I’m in much better condition to 
plod on toward home and if you’ll give me my hat I’ll plod 
right away.” 

Jim and Mary called on Miss Ganz at eleven the next day 
and found her overwhelmed with callers and much improved 
in looks and strength. She had begun to be her old self. 
Word had gone out that she had been ordered to the city 
hospital for a week and her friends all crowded in to see her 
before she went. Jim and Mary joined the throng that ac¬ 
companied her to the depot. “The doctor says you’ll only 
be in the hospital for a week,” said Jim as they shook hands 
with her before the train pulled out. “We’ll be in to see you 
next Friday forenoon and I’ll give you this bunch of blossoms 
from our garden so you’ll have something to remember us by.” 

“And I slipped a little note in the centre of the bouquet,” 
whispered Mary. 

Carrie’s eyes sparkled with delight as she took the bouquet. 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 191 

The crowd pressed around to bid her farewell; the train started 
and she was gone. She waved farewells till they swept 
around a curve and then she turned eagerly to the bouquet 
and pressed the blossoms to her lips. The note fell out. 
She opened it and read: “Pray without ceasing. ,, With 
bowed head she followed the admonition and silently prayed 
for strength to carry her through her trials. 


CHAPTER XIII 


O NE of the families that the church had become in¬ 
terested in was the Merkels who lived some miles 
back in the country. They were on a side road, off 
by themselves. There were five children and Mr. Merkel. 
Mrs. Merkel had passed away a year ago and the oldest girl, 
Stella, was the housekeeper. The family had come to the 
neighborhood very poor and had rented the farm and had 
hard luck. One thing went wrong after another. Jim had 
found them and had the children in his Sunday-school and 
the church was taking an active interest in them. 

One Sunday the children did not appear as usual and in the 
evening Mary drove out to see why. She found more hard 
luck. Mr. Merkel had broken his leg the day before. The 
doctor had been there and set the bones and he was in good 
shape but laid up for a long time. Stella and Roger, the ten 
and eight year olds, were working like veterans under Mr. 
Merkel’s directions to take care of the house and the stock 
and do what must be done but they could do but little while 
doing their best. 

Mary turned in and did a half day’s work in a couple of 
hours. She felt like crying as she looked at the two mother¬ 
less little ones and their three juniors going along so bravely 
but missing their mother morning, noon, and night, every min¬ 
ute of their waking hours. When Mary arrived Stella was 
in the kitchen washing the dishes and the tears were running 
down her cheeks and then Roger went out to dry the plates 
as she washed them and the two children wept silently at their 
work as if their hearts would break. 

Mary went out to help them and to cheer them up and as 
they worked Stella told her in childish confidence that she and 


192 


193 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

Roger had to be brave and couldn’t cry while they were with 
their papa and the younger children because they had to 
cheer him and them up all they could but the dishwashing 
and the kitchen work brought back so many memories of 
mama that every time they got out there alone they had a 
good cry all by themselves. She said: “Mama used to wash 
the dishes and Roger and me wiped them and put the ones on 
the lower shelves away and while mama worked she used to 
sing the nicest pieces and Roger and me would join in where 
we could and we would all sing together while we did up the 
housework and we remember just how she used to wash each 
dish and how she used to do each part of the work and how 
nice a time we had. Then when the things were all in their 
places and the house all clean and dusted we would all gather 
round the little table before the kitchen fire and she would 
read to us out of some nice story book or tell us stories till 
bedtime for us and after that she and papa would sit by the 
fire and read and talk some more; and now she isn’t with us 
any more and never will be again and oh, if she could only 
come back to us for a little while once more,” and she and 
Roger put their arms around each other and went to the corner 
to the settee and cried till their eyes were red and swollen. 

Mary noticed that Mrs. Merkel must have been a good 
housekeeper as well as a good mother for every article of 
furniture in the rooms was clean and tidy and arranged just 
as it should be. The children had got their style of doing the 
work very orderly from their mother. She comforted the 
two sorrowful children as much as she could and got them 
started to work again as the best means to get them to for¬ 
get their troubles. When she was ready to go home she said 
to Mr. Merkel: “I’ll be back to-morrow and will get you some 
one to help here till you are able to be around. To-night 
if you don’t mind I’ll take the two little ones with me and per¬ 
haps we can make arrangements to keep them most of the 
time till you are able to be up and at work.” 

Mr. Merkel thankfully accepted the offer as it relieved him 
of a great deal of anxiety. Mary took the little children, one 


194 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

of them just able to toddle around by itself and the other not 
much older, and started home. The two motherless little 
things had already made friends with her and went along 
readily but Stella and Roger stood in the doorway and 
watched them go with tears in their eyes. The bonds of 
family affection were stronger even than usual because of the 
isolation and because the responsibility for the care of the 
youngest children had been thrown largely on the shoulders 
of the two oldest since their mother died and it seemed to them 
that this was another separation that might be permanent. 
Mr. Merkel called them to him and comforted them as well as 
he could although his own heart was as heavy as lead. 

Mary lifted the little ones into the auto and placed one 
on each side of her in the seat and started toward home. It 
had changed from twilight to darkness while she was finishing 
the work in the house and before she had gone far complete 
darkness succeeded the semi-darkness. She had switched 
on the lights before she left. She was just rounding a curve 
in the road when a big auto, without any warning at all, 
roared around the beginning of the curve behind her and came 
thundering down on her without giving her any chance to 
avoid a collision. The big machine was traveling like an 
express train and had no lights. Mary tried to turn out to let 
it pass as soon as she saw what the situation was but there was 
no time to do anything. The distance between the ma¬ 
chines when they could first see each other was so short that 
the oncoming one roared across the intervening space in what 
seemed no time at all. Its driver didn’t either see the auto¬ 
mobile in the road ahead of him or didn’t care and trusted to 
the obstruction getting out of the way and he never slacked 
his tremendous speed. When the collision was inevitable he 
veered slightly to one side but he was too late. Sweeping 
on like a hurricane the big black machine, that had its cur¬ 
tains all drawn making a closed car, struck the rear tire of 
Mary’s auto with a front wheel and jumped clear up into the 
air but came down running at the same tremendous speed 
and careened toward the ditch. It went through the ditch 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 195 

and over the opposite bank, ploughing the mud with two 
wheels, but it did not upset as the ditch and bank were both 
shallow just there. The driver never tried to stop or even 
slow up. He turned his wheel and without slackening his 
pace went out again over the low embankment and angling 
across the ditch out into the road disappeared instantly with 
a loud roar that could be heard for a long distance. 

When the front wheel of the big machine struck the rear 
wheel of the lighter auto it sent the latter in a gymnast somer¬ 
sault clear across the ditch into the fence. The ditch was 
deeper on that side and the auto ploughed into the farther 
bank and turned upside down against a fence post breaking it 
off. Mary had been caught by the steering wheel and lay 
under the auto, seemingly dead. The baby was thrown 
clear of the machine and lay motionless as if killed. The 
oldest child was also thrown out clear of the machine but was 
only dazed by the fall; too much dazed to make any outcry. 

Immediately after the collision another automobile roared 
past without any lights or any warning and then another; a 
caravan of bootleggers from British Columbia on their way 
to the city with their cargoes. 

The little tot that was able to get up staggered around for 
a time and finally got across the ditch and into the road. It 
was pitch dark but instinct urged the little girl on and she 
toddled along the road, sometimes off to one side, but keep¬ 
ing fairly well on the main track. A little while afterward 
the family of Henry Martinson, whose house was just beyond 
the beginning of the curve, heard their dog Rover making 
an unusual demonstration. The dog was so insistent in 
his uproar, running down toward the road and then back 
again and barking furiously all the time, that Henry hastily 
lit his lantern and started to investigate for Rover was 
a worldly, sophisticated dog who didn’t usually get excited 
over trifles. Mrs. Martinson and the children followed him 
through curiosity. 

The dog led them to the gate and there crouching against 
the gate post, as if afraid of the dog, was little Lena Merkel 


196 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

dusty and begrimed, with blood spattered lightly over her 
face and dress and showing a pitiable forlornness. Rover at 
once quieted down and greeted the little girl by running up 
to her in a friendly way, wagging his tail and profuse in his 
canine apologies for raising such a disturbance. “For good¬ 
ness’ sake, what is this?” exclaimed Henry. “Is there any 
one with you, little one?” Lena did not answer but stood 
there clinging to the post as if it were her best friend. Mrs. 
Martinson picked her up. “Are you all alone, child?” she 
asked wonderingly as the whole family tried to look out 
through the darkness up and down the road in efforts to solve 
the mystery of the lost little girl. 

Lena partly came to herself when Mrs. Martinson picked 
her up in her arms and she realized that she was close to a 
friend. “Missus dead!” she said. 

“Who is it is dead, little one?” asked Mrs. Martinson. 
There was no answer. “Where are they dead?” again she 
asked coaxingly. 

“Missus dead,” said Lena, and pointed down the road. 

“Something has happened, Henry. I’ll bet it’s something 
connected with those bootleggers,” said Mrs. Martinson. 

“Roy,” said Mr. Martinson, turning to his oldest boy, 
“run into the garage and bring out our Ford. We’ll go down 
the road and investigate. We’ll walk on with the little girl 
and you catch up with us. Be sure that your lights are on 
both front and rear. Hurry now!” 

Martinson and his wife, carrying Lena, started down the 
road, Mrs. Martinson still trying to get information from Lena 
but getting nothing except, “Missus dead,” and a tiny finger 
pointed along the road. A machine came up and they turned, 
thinking it was theirs. “Hello, Henry, how are you? Good 
evening, Mrs. Martinson,” said a voice from the auto. 

“It’s Big Jim Albright,” said Martinson. “Good evening, 
Jim, we are going up the road to investigate something,” 
and he told Jim of the circumstance. 

“I’ll go ahead,” said Jim hastily as soon as he heard the 
story. “ You folks can follow. Mary went up to the Merkels’ 


197 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

this evening and hasn’t got back. I heard those bootleggers 
whizz by and thought I’d come out and meet her.” He drove 
on. The Martinson auto followed in a moment and came to 
the scene of the wreck shortly after Jim had arrived. 

Jim had parked his car so as to throw a light on the wreck. 
He had seen the baby lying there on the ground as if dead and 
had just run around the auto to where Mary was. One lucky 
circumstance had intervened. The top of the auto had been 
down and the wind shield although broken rested on the base 
of the broken fence post and Mary was lying there unconscious 
but the weight of the auto was evidently not bearing down on 
her. Jim grasped the auto and with the strength of half-a- 
dozen men lifted the front of it up as Henry Martinson ran 
around and tried to pull Mary from underneath. He could 
not do so. “I think her foot’s caught somehow,” Henry said 
as he and Mrs. Martinson tugged to get her out. 

“Hold on,” said Jim, “we must be careful.” He laid the 
auto down gently again on the broken post. “We must get 
a couple of these posts under the machine the first thing.” 
He jumped to his machine and without waiting to try to find 
the key with one mighty wrench he tore the lock from the tool 
box, grasped his pliers, and dashed back again to the fence. 
He cut the wires around two fence posts. He grasped one 
of the posts by the top and broke it clear off at the ground; 
the other he loosened in an instant by shaking it back and 
forward till he could pull it straight up. He took the two 
posts and the top of the broken one. “Now, Henry, when 
I lift the auto you folks put these posts firmly one on top of 
the other under it.” 

He lifted the machine up, got his knees under it, and lifted 
it still higher. They placed the posts. He let the machine 
down easy on the posts. “Now, Henry, you come here and 
hold it steady.” He then went round and loosened Mary’s 
foot and dress where they were caught and running around 
to the other side dragged her out. “Alive, yes,” said Jim. 
“Thank God!” He carried her round and laid her on the 
grass. Mrs. Martinson picked up the baby. “They’re all 


198 . BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

alive,” she said. “I believe they’re all just badly stunned and 
bruised. - You all come to our place, Jim. Roy, you run 
ahead and ’phone for Doctor Partridge. Tell him it’s an 
auto accident. Twq people are unconscious. He’ll under¬ 
stand.” ~ 

Jim and Henry lifted the unconscious forms into the two 
autos. The baby showed signs of returning consciousness 
before they reached the house and Mary revived shortly after¬ 
ward. Both were bruised and battered but Doctor Partridge 
said: “No bones are broken and no one seriously injured. A 
two weeks’ convalescence will put them on their feet again. 
The baby will probably be very much alive to-morrow morn¬ 
ing.” 

By the time Jim got home with Mary the news had spread 
throughout the neighborhood and people began coming from 
far and near. It took one person’s time to relate to the 
arrivals how the incident occurred and a girl was placed at 
the telephone to answer queries there. The indignation was 
intense. Each individual knew that he or some of his family 
might be killed to-morrow night or any night by the rum 
crews who made the leading highways a danger zone as soon 
as darkness came each evening. There were loud complaints 
about the non-enforcement of the laws against these bootleg¬ 
ging speeders and Henry Martinson called a public meeting 
at the hall for the next night to discuss the matter and get 
action somehow. Jim was too busy taking care of Mary 
to join much in the general buzz but when Martinson told 
him of the meeting he said: “I’m going to fight whether the 
community fights or not. We have to kill this auto bootleg 
traffic or abandon the roads or be killed ourselves. We have 
the three choices.” 

The meeting was an outpouring, seemingly from all over 
the county, and was the most representative gathering of the 
most substantial element ever held in the district. The hall 
was not half large enough and the meeting was held outside. 
Old Lawrence Dayton, seventy-six years old, wearing the 
little iron button of the G.A.R., grizzled but alert, rose up 


199 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

just as the crowd passed out of the hall to the yard. He 
marched up on the steps with a double-barrelled shotgun on 
his shoulder, faced the crowd, and said: “Im here. I fought 
once for four years that we might have a country called the 
United States to live in and I’m now ready to fight the gang of 
criminals who are disputing our right to live in this American 
territory.” The old man’s words were welcomed with a tu¬ 
multuous cheer or rather a tumultuous yell that echoed and 
reechoed. He was promptly made chairman. Men were 
called on for speeches. They were of the hot-shot variety; 
short, strong, sensible, determined. Many of the crowd, 
seemingly a majority, were in favor of going out on the high¬ 
ways with their guns and stopping the frenzied bootlegging 
speeders without any other warrant than a riddling of both 
machines and drivers with buckshot and bullets. 

Calls for Big Jim Albright came from all sides and Jim 
went to the front. He talked for only a few minutes but that 
was enough. He said: “The big criminals of the country 
have formed a union to run the United States for their bene¬ 
fit. The fellows who want to live decently and in obedience 
to the laws must either join them or get out, they say. That’s 
the ultimatum the brewer, the distiller, the ex-saloon keeper, 
the big trader in booze, the owner of the dives, the so-called 
respectable citizen who will do anything for money, have 
given out. All these have given out their commands to you 
and to me and they have taken in their union the ex-convict, 
the thug, the dope fiend, the booze fiend, the fallen woman, 
most of the pool halls, most of the city chaufFeurs, most of the 
waiters and waitressess, many of the soft-drink establish¬ 
ments, all the petty criminals and all the riffraff and scum of 
American cities and that other numerous moron element of 
our people who are for ever hovering between crime and re¬ 
spectability, sometimes on one side, sometimes on the other. 

“The sole object of the union is to nullify the constitution 
of the United States, the supreme law of the land. They 
say to us, ‘we will trample the constitution and laws made in 
accordance with it into the mire of the earth because they 


200 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

interfere with our personal liberty.’ They say as an excuse 
for their criminality that the American people are not in 
favor of our constitution and laws which we adopted almost 
unanimously and as proof they point to the unpunished riot 
of criminal violations of our laws by the members of their 
own criminal union. They challenge American citizenship 
to enforce the American constitution and the laws that go 
with it. With amazing gall they make the offer that if we 
abandon the American constitution and our American laws 
we can have the criminal code of this criminal union in their 
place. The criminal code of this criminal union is ‘ Personal 
Liberty,’ the right of each individual to do as he pleases un¬ 
restrained by law. 

“Their reasoning that although the constitution and laws 
forbid it that they have a right to make, import, sell, and drink 
whiskey because the fundamental unwritten law of personal 
liberty guarantees them such rights can logically be adopted 
by the burglar, the fire fiend, the hold-up man, the sneak thief, 
the bigamist, the perjurer, the murderer. If the booze 
criminal has a personal liberty right superior to our consti¬ 
tutional laws and can set them aside so has every other 
criminal and he also can set them aside. The whole theory 
of this criminal union is a conception of monstrous anarchy; 
trample constitution and laws if they interfere with your 
personal liberty; that is with your own wishes as to what you 
want to do to your fellowman. 

“All the membership of this criminal union is not one ten 
thousandth of our population. Travel all over the real 
United States and to-day you see no whiskey nor hear of any 
among the one hundred and ten million real Americans. 
They are farming and laboring for wages and merchandizing 
and trading and railroading and building houses and running 
factories and great industries and living and dying without 
knowing there is such a thing as whiskey. This is a pro¬ 
hibition nation by choice because our real citizenship doesn’t 
want whiskey. But this criminal union has its little one 
hundred thousand members located in the great centres of 


201 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

population, at strategic points, among the one hundred and 
ten million law-abiding citizens, and this union poses as the 
majority and says ‘we the people’ in its astounding propa¬ 
ganda. 

“If two hundred and fifty thousand of us fellows here in 
this district away out here in the northwest corner of the 
northwest district of the United States, in the most prosperous 
and beautiful region on earth, who are for the American con¬ 
stitution and laws, allow one thousand criminals, degenerate in 
thought, word, and deed according to law-abiding standards, 
to run us out of the country so that they may take possession 
of it and run it as a booze hell we deserve all we get, and more. 
If we abdicate our American manhood we deserve the reward 
of cowards and curs. I am in favor of a strong delegation 
marching down to the sheriff and the prosecuting attorney 
and county commissioners and the superior judge and saying 
to them: ‘We want the laws of the United States enforced. 
Any officer who does not enforce them get out and get out 
quick. All we need is law enforcement, real law enforce¬ 
ment, and these criminals will scurry like scared rats to their 
holes in the slums.” 

At the close of the meeting Jim’s plan was adopted without 
a dissenting vote and old Lawrence Dayton was made its 
chairman. 

The panorama of the formidable committee of farmers 
gathering at the school house on the next Monday morning, 
proceeding to the county court house and interviewing in turn 
the officials named by Jim could all be seen as one picture in 
a short conversation. In the afternoon of that day the county 
commissioner from the third district called up Lew Delker 
over the ’phone and said: “That you, Lew? Well, say, all 
the ranchers from all over the north country, three million of 
them more or less, have just been in to protest to the county 
authorities against somebody’s wild bootleggers running war 
chariots down the main roads after night at a thousand miles 
an hour; no lights nor warnings given any travelers on the 
road. The army of ranchers have seen us and the sheriff and 


202 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

the attorney and then all marched in to see the judge; so it’s 
pretty serious. Now if you know any one who has any in¬ 
fluence with these wild night riders I wish you would have 
these automobile flying wedges on the main highways stopped 
and stopped at once. It’s up to someone to stop them to¬ 
night or there will be doings up north and funerals will be 
held and we’ll get the blame. You understand?” 

“Sure, we’ll protect you and all our friends. That’s what 
we’re here for. There won’t be a bootlegger on any road from 
the north in one hour from now. We’ll see that the interests 
of our friends up at the courthouse are looked after. Glad 
you called me up. There won’t be any more complaint along 
that line. We’re also shaping up for you for next election. 
You’re on our slate and we’ll put in money enough to carry 
you through. Good-bye! I’ll get busy right now.” 


CHAPTER XIV 


L EW DELKER and two of his henchmen, Red Barth and 
A 1 Leyton, were in Delker’s office talking over things 
-■ generally in their line, which was whiskey and how 
its entrance and sale were progressing. They didn’t get 
down to particulars but just gossiped of the news. 

“By the way,” said Lew, “it’s time we got some of our 
people together and outlined a plan for our campaign. The 
primary election isn’t far off now and we should get a move 
on us in time.” 

“Why not make a list of the fellows who are twenty-four 
carat whiskey,” said Red, “and get them together here where 
the atmosphere is congenial and a bottle is handy and make 
some political medicine?” 

“Good idea,” said Delker, “just have a talkfest among our¬ 
selves; not interfere with the political powers in each ward or 
district or make slates or chow that we’re trying to boss the 
situation but just talk over matters and get ideas. Here, 
Red, you take the paper and pencil and we’ll jot down a list 
and I’ll get round among them to-morrow and ask them 
quietly to drop in. There can’t be any objections to that by 
any one.” 

“All right,” said Red. “ First there’s our three selves, now 
who’s next?” 

“Well,” suggested Delker, “we need Ernest Deeton, 
He’s a lawyer and a good one and a number-one politician. 
He knows every trick in the political game, can stack the cards 
himself or keep the other fellow from doing it, and he knows 
the legal end of both politics and the whiskey trade; also he 
knows on which side his bread is buttered and where his fees 
come from these days and he’s willing to be a good scout for 


203 


204 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

dividends any time, also he’ll swap drinks with us any hour 
of the day. We’ll put him down first.” 

“ Correct,” said Red. 

“Now there’s Ross Roline. He went to the legislature by 
the grace of the whiskey vote and he will want to go again. 
His firm is one of the leading wholesalers in the northwest 
and Ross and Tom Devane will give our talk the necessary 
business men’s tone. If we can label our man as candidate 
of the business men whose platform is honesty, economy, 
and efficiency it will look well and take with the average voter 
and he’s the voter who elects. Then we must have Rev. D. 
L. Lemarck. He’s the Christian champion of light wines and 
beer and would take a drink of Scotch if he were dared. He 
doesn’t have any hesitation about saying where he stands 
and a highly moral flavoring will place our little meeting up 
on a virtuous pedestal. The church has a right to demand 
liberty for all and we can gently push him right to the front. 
Then there’s Don Clegg. He owns a big garage and repre¬ 
sents the business men and is a sporting club manager and a 
baseball club magnate and has an interest in at least three 
dance halls and represents the big sporting element. We 
have Harv Linditt. He represents the cook’s union and 
MissAllineLeard, she bosses the waitresses’union, and George 
Greynor represents the waiters’ union. These unions all 
know that a few tablefuls of fellows and girls who feel the 
goodfellowship and generosity that always follows a close 
acquaintance with a bottle are worth more in tips than a 
thousand times as many water-drinking puritans. Lefevre 
and Mauser and Tony Attilio will represent the foreigners. 
Doug Hilden can speak for the American Federation of Labor 
and he and Art Swinson will represent the laboring man. I’ll 
run across two or three fellows of the old-time liquor crowd 
and bring in a small assortment of handy men who will be 
wise to the game and put the other fellows wise who are close 
to the line of respectability or below it. Votes is votes with 
us. We’ll meet here at eight to-morrow night.” 

The meeting the next evening did not disappoint Lew 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 


205 






Delker. His office and all the adjoining rooms were thrown 
together and the entire space was jammed with a varied 
throng that he, as the host of the evening, greeted as they 
arrived one by one or in bunches. It was with a feeling of 
pride in his achievement in gathering so many leaders in the 
little divisions of territory and trade and calling in the city 
that he opened the meeting by informally squeezing small 
tables into the midst of the groups and just as informally 
setting out glasses and bottles of liquor of different kinds along 
with cigars and matches. It was the silent opening address 
of the campaign and it was received with a tumult of hilarious 
welcome. Everyone got merry at once and the liquor 
gurgled on all sides and glasses were raised in all directions to 
faces wreathed in smiles as jokes and quips filled the air. 
Lew Delker had made a hit at the beginning. 

When the drinks had got well started and the cigar smoke 
filled the air with blue Lew opened the meeting by calling 
their attention to its object. He said: “The political cam¬ 
paign is about to open. All here are friends although their 
may be some differences of opinion politically. We are not 
party men. These differences of political opinion are natural 
and do not mean any personal differences. In matters of 
principle we are all united and it is on that ground that we 
meet here this evening. I am only interested in the campaign 
to the extent that I want to see candidates put up and elected 
who will show liberal common sense in all things. I thought 
that a better understanding among those who feel like I do 
in these matters might be obtained if a small gathering like 
this were brought together to talk over any subject that any 
one might bring forward in connection with the campaign. 
The meeting is informal, no speeches, no formality of any 
kind, any one is free to dip in and say anything they wish.” 

There was handclappingwhen he sat down and Don Reinar, 
a lawyer, said, “I am more interested in the law-enforcement 
officers than the others like the auditor and surveyors. Who 
is going to be a candidate for sheriff in the primaries?” 

“That we don’t know yet,” said Lew. “I heard this after- 





206 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

noon that Big Jim Albright would be put forward by the 
prohibs. If he is I suppose he’ll be opposed by some liberal. 
I haven’t heard any liberal mentioned yet.” 

“I fancy Jim will have hard sledding,” said Reinar. “I 
couldn’t vote for him under any circumstances. He’s a good 
fellow but awful narrow, too narrow for me.” 

“When are the elections?” asked someone in the rear. By 
this time the crowd had settled down comfortably in their 
chairs with cigars in mouths and glasses that were raised inter¬ 
mittently whenever any one felt like taking a sip or a drink. 

“The primary election, where we all vote to nominate 
candidates for the different parties, takes place in two 
months. Each voter in that primary election will be handed 
a ticket showing all the candidates’ names. If he’s a 
Republican he’ll see there a Republican ticket with the 
names of all the fellows on it who want to be Republican 
candidates for the different offices. If he’s a Democrat he’ll 
have before him a full Democratic ticket and in either case 
he goes into the booth and votes for his favorite candidates. 
The votes are counted and the highest man on the Republi¬ 
can ticket is nominated as the Republican candidate and the 
highest man on the Democratic ticket is the Democratic can¬ 
didate. Then two months later comes the real election when 
these candidates that have been nominated in the primary 
election are put on the Republican and Democratic tickets 
and voted on to decide which will be the official for the 
next two years. Whichever gets the most votes is elected.” 

“The primary nominating system is dead against us, don’t 
you think?” asked someone. 

“I think not,” said Delker, as he blew a ring of smoke 
thoughtfully toward the ceiling. “I think it was made for 
us liberals. I take it that all the fellows who are discon¬ 
tented and want to have things changed to their way are lib¬ 
erals; and that’s us. The primary system is a reformed fake, 
put out in the name of reform, but really to give all kickers 
a chance to be seen and heard. It was sponsored by kickers, 
the minority fellows with a big mouth and the loud voice 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 207 

and the general brain, the brain that is so general that it 
scatters when it goes off like one of those old army muskets 
that pepper the whole side of a barn. That’s the kind of 
brain that you find in the real political reformer such as was 
behind the direct primary nominating system. Those fellows 
couldn’t stay in any party because they had too much 
ballyhoo. They were sat down on in the previous convention 
nominating system because their brains scattered too much. 
They sort of united on this primary system for nominating 
officers and raised a rookus about it and one idea connected 
with it caught the public fancy. 

“That idea was this: That if we had this system of nomina¬ 
tions every voter in the United States would go to the polls, 
get his list of candidates, walk into the booth, vote for his 
candidate and go home. The result would be the real thought¬ 
ful decision of all the voters in the country. This idea was 
taken up by tens of thousands of sane men who were convinced 
it would work out just that way. It was reasonable and just 
and moral and promised to do away with the boss system of 
the conventions and every other so-called evil. 

“It was the kickers and the loud mouths who began the 
agitation that ended in this law. In practice it has proved to 
be a system that favors the kickers and the loud mouths and 
demagogues and the fellows who have a mission of some sort 
and it favors the minority because in practice the minority 
that understands the game and votes together can beat the 
majority every time if the majority doesn’t concentrate 
its vote, which it never does. It’s the political dream of the 
kicker and the political minority come true. We are kickers 
and our liberalism is made up of minorities, a lot of diverse 
elements, united because of a common personal interest, and 
the direct primary nominating system is our meat and drink. 
It was made for us.” 

“The underlying idea of it in theory is very taking,” said 
a voice in the rear. 

“Yes, the underlying idea in theory is like an edict of the 
gods. All voters will vote. The result is the voice of the 


208 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

people. The voice of the people is the voice of God. That’s 
pretty. It’s political idealism and like every other political 
idealism to-day when it comes to be put in practice is an awful 
political fake, a humbug, a fraud, a cheater of the majority 
voter.” 

“ As to the voters going and voting they seem to have gone 
in some of our elections. You remember our mayoralty 
elections in Seattle, for instance,” said someone else. 

“Yes, and they give point to just what I have said. I 
remember every mayoralty election in Seattle since 1894, for 
thirty years, and there hasn’t been one of them that has been 
a real election based on real municipal issues. Wherever and 
whenever there was a real municipal issue to be voted on the 
voters did not vote. I saw elections for bond issues that 
were to change the entire destiny of Seattle and only a fraction 
of voters voted intelligently on those bond issues; very few 
voters indeed out of the whole number took any interest in 
them. It’s the same in every state, city, and county; the 
voters do not and will not vote on candidates that are for or 
against real issues. The elections you speak of, where the 
voters came out by the thousands to vote for or against a 
mayor, have practically all been fought out on so-called moral 
issues; a cleaning up of the town. If you raise the question 
in any city of cleaning out the gambling houses or segregating 
immorality you get out a full vote, a frenzied vote, but on no 
big public questions of real municipal importance will you get 
a full vote or a half vote or anything over a quarter; more 
likely a fifth of the vote. I’m talking facts as shown in the 
election returns in Seattle, the city that you cite, a certain 
proof. For thirty years each mayoralty election has been 
fought on some little miserable moral issue and the voters 
have piled over one another to vote, but during all the real 
development of the city the really big public questions 
haven’t even had a respectable vote. In practice the primary 
nominating system is a fake because the voter doesn’t vote 
on a real political issue. The theory is political perfection; 
the practise is a political joke.” 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 209 

“ But how about the bosses ? They used to run the conven¬ 
tions when we had the convention nominating system.” 

“Yes, and the bosses are with us to-day and always will 
be. The boss has changed his tactics, that’s all. Whenever 
under the convention system the voters didn’t take things 
in their own hands some boss did. Somebody had to do it. 
Nowadays under this direct primary system the voters are 
not deciding the real political issues and someone is doing 
the work they leave undone. It’s the boss, but he is doing 
it different from he used to; his methods are different; the 
results are the same.” 

“Well, every fellow, no matter how poor he is, has a 
chance to be a candidate under this system if he can get a 
few signers to a petition. Under the old convention system 
he had to have a nomination by the convention or he couldn’t 
be a candidate.” 

“Yes, and that’s where another delusion deluded the good 
folks who rushed into the direct primary. Here’s a fact: 
No poor man can be a candidate to-day for any state or na¬ 
tional office and he can’t afford to be a candidate even for 
a county office. He has to make one campaign all over the 
state for the primary election. Then he has to turn right 
around and make another campaign all over the state for the 
real election. His first campaign is all directed to win the 
voters of his own party; his final campaign is directed to win 
the voters of all parties. The expense is prohibitive. Under 
the old convention system the voters of the party made the 
campaign for the candidate. They paid for his halls, pro¬ 
vided music, furnished his audiences, paid for all his publicity. 
His nomination cost him nothing much and his one campaign 
cost very little. Any poor man could afford to be a candidate 
under the convention system. None but a rich man, or one 
with similar advantages, can possibly be a candidate under 
this direct primary. The delusions of the public with re¬ 
gard to the direct primary make up a complicated system of 
superstition. The theory is that all the voters decide; that 
any poor man can be a candidate. The voters do not decide 


210 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

questions involving financial and industrial and economic 
policies and a poor man can only afford to be a candidate for 
a local office. However, facts have no effect on a public 
superstition.” 

‘‘Well, in this free for all a voter can at least pick a man of 
his own kind and choice. He doesn’t have a convention pick 
his man for him.” 

“And that is another part of this same public superstition. 
A voter can vote intelligently as to the qualifications, charac¬ 
ter, ability and principles, moral and political, of his neigh¬ 
bor, because he knows his neighbor intimately. He may even 
get a knowledge sufficient to vote intelligently among men 
in his own county because he is close to them and can get 
some information. Beyond that he is lost. No voter can 
vote intelligently on state candidates or national candidates 
unless they are nominated by conventions of a party. If a 
party nominates a representative in congress or a senator 
or a president he is labelled. He represents the party 
principles. The voter doesn’t vote for the man. He votes 
for the principles he represents. But in this direct primary 
election where there are several candidates for congress on 
his party ticket the voter is completely hoodooed. He 
doesn’t know any of them and has no way of finding out re¬ 
garding them. It is the same even for supreme court judges 
and all the state officers. Not one voter out of ten thousand 
votes intelligently on state or national officers under this 
system.” 

“But this public freedom of voting directly as to who shall 
be our candidates will tend to give us better men in office.” 

“That is another part of the public delusion. The fact is 
that it puts in office men of mediocre ability, demagogues, 
loud mouths, narrow-minded theorists, and tends to retain 
this class in office. A fellow who is in office is in a position 
to advertise himself at public expense. When the next elec¬ 
tion comes on he is the only one out of perhaps half a dozen 
who is known to any great number of voters in the state and 
he gets enough votes for that reason alone to keep him in 


211 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

office. The best advertised candidate gets the office under 
this direct primary system. The system caters to these 
breeds of candidates because they are the ones who are the 
best advertised: To the loud-mouthed demagogue, the fellow 
who is already in office, the fellow who can command the 
support and influence of the big newspapers, and the fellow 
with much money who can throw it away advertising himself. 
The poor man of good ability and good intentions cannot 
afford to advertise himself as these other fellows can and he is 
not nominated. 

" Contrast the United States senators of the present day 
who were chosen by direct primary to the Jim Blaines and 
the Roscoe Conklings and the Judge Thurmans and the 
James A. Garfields and the John Shermans and their states¬ 
men comrades of the senates of other days elected under the 
convention systems. This is a fact: The conventions chose 
brilliant men, broad of vision, eloquent of speech, supremely 
able men, leaders among the people in thought and action; 
the pick and choice of great parties after the chaff and dust 
of mediocrity, half-baked theory, and loud-mouthed empty- 
pated demagoguism had been winnowed out and blown away 
by the free air circulating in open conventions. 

“The directprimary system choosesmen of justthe opposite 
calibre. We can discard the fact and we do so; we believe 
the superstition but the fact remains. Mediocrity to-day has 
the field to itself and it just wallows its way; it's wallowing on 
all sides, whichever way we look. And the American citizen is 
paying the bills, the piled-up cost rising from our own de¬ 
lusions regarding the good results of the direct primary sys¬ 
tem. But I’m in favor of it, very much in favor of it.” 

“How’s that?” laughed one of the men. “If it’s a series 
of public delusions; if the voters don’t get out and vote on 
big public issues, and I admit they don’t; and if the bosses 
are still in control, and I know well they are; and if no poor 
man has a chance to be a candidate in state or nation, and 
that’s the truth; and if the man of ability stands dignifiedly 
on one side and leaves the field to the mediocre blatherskite 


212 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

or the mediocre money bags, as I know well he does, why do 
you endorse it?” 

“I endorse it because we’re a minority gang and we want 
to get control. We want to take the government completely 
out of the hands of the majority and this direct primary 
system of nominating candidates was made for just such 
minorities as we are. It was made by the kickers and that 
means the minorities and they made it just for what we are 
going to use it for; to bludgeon the majority; knock them so 
silly that they won’t know what has hit them or how it was 
done. We, a minority, want to govern the majority and 
we’ll do it through this reformer’s delusion. It’s a minority 
blackjack.” 

“How will that come to pass?” 

“Well, for instance, Big Jim Albright runs for sheriff on the 
Republican ticket. He isn’t known all over the district but 
he’s well known around home. He’s the candidate of the 
ultra-dries, the fighting, persecutive, puritan prohibs who 
put the prohibition law in the constitution itself. We’ll put 
up a man of his principles in every ward and precinct of the 
district on his ticket. Then we have him. Each of these 
fellow’s neighbors will vote for their neighbor because they 
know him and they don’t know Big Jim Albright. There’s 
no expense for a candidate under this system in his own 
neighborhood so that we can rake up a multitude of prohibi¬ 
tion candidates for sheriff without any trouble and each one 
will get the votes of his neighbors. Consequently no one 
prohib candidate will have a big vote. Their vote will be all 
split up. Then we’ll put up our own man; the candidate of 
the liberals on the Republican ticket, and we liberals will all 
vote for him and he’ll have a big vote, much bigger than the 
vote of any one prohib and when the primary returns are 
announced our man will be the Republican candidate; 
nominated by a plurality vote of the people; by a minority 
of the voters of the district.” 

“But how about the other tickets?” 

“We’ll do the same thing with the other tickets. If our 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 213 

little minority finds that the Democrats are going to nominate 
a liberal we’ll stand with them but if some radical prohib 
Democrat is going to win their nomination we’ll do just the 
same to him as we will do to Big Jim Albright, start back fires 
all over the political woods, and use this direct primary sys¬ 
tem to our minority advantage.” 

“So we’ll have a liberal Republican running against a 
liberal Democrat in the final election then and no prohib in 
the race.” 

“Precisely, thus worketh the direct primary. If the liberal 
Republican is elected this minority rejoices and rules; if the 
liberal Democrat is elected this minority rejoices and rules. 
The system stacks our cards for us.” 

“But won’t the opposition do the same?” 

“Certainly not. A majority is top heavy, unwieldy, 
easily split up, always disorganized into cliques. Our 
minority is a cohesive unit, we are united on one principle, 
the principle of liberality in whiskey. We each and all have a 
personal interest in having our liberal principle win at the 
polls. Candidates for us are a means to an end only; one 
candidate is better than another only because he is more 
liberal; because he would shut his eyes oftener or shut them 
tighter or put more blinders on his deputies. Our minority 
will vote together, just as all minorities do; the majority 
will not vote together at the critical time, just as all majorities 
are prone not to do.” 

“And what if by accident they get one prohib candidate 
on either ticket?” 

“Then we unite all the kickers and minorities against him 
and throw that vote in along with the usual opposition. 
The minority wins in that case also. Its vote cast unitedly 
against any one candidate will beat him. Did you ever stop 
to think of this fact, and it is a fact: it doesn’t take one quar¬ 
ter of the political force or influence to beat a man that it 
takes to elect him. You can beat a man by clamor or trickery 
or a union of little adverse influences that if turned the other 
way under like circumstances wouldn’t come within a thou- 


214 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

sand miles of electing him. An electing influence must be 
four times stronger than a defeating influence to have equal 
results.” 

The meeting broke up long after midnight and established 
Delker’s leadership among the certain classes represented. 


CHAPTER XV 


R APID developments took place in the local political 
field. Another meeting of the farmers was held at 
which progress was reported by old Lawrence Day- 
ton on behalf of his committee. All the officials were willing 
to act at once that they had seen and they had a long talk with 
the superior judge who pointed out that any official who 
sidestepped his oath of office could be removed. “In con¬ 
nection with that,” said Mr. Dayton, “I might say myself 
that I believe the complete success of this prohibition law 
demands that no one be elected to office of any kind unless he 
is favorable to the law. We go to the sheriff but above the 
sheriff and around the sheriff are others and the others must 
be right or the law doesn’t function.” 

The coming primary election to nominate officers was dis¬ 
cussed and explained and as the focus point of law enforce¬ 
ment was the sherifPs office a strong resolution was passed 
after many speeches endorsing Big Jim Albright for sheriff. 
It was decided that as no convention was available a com¬ 
mittee should be appointed to circulate and file legal petitions 
for him as a candidate. Jim was called before the meeting 
and was greeted with a storm of cheers. He thanked his 
neighbors for their confidence in him, said that the offer had 
come so suddenly that he wasn’t prepared just then to say 
what he could do but he would let the head of the committee 
know at ten in the morning. This was satisfactory as it was 
felt that he would accept. 

Mary was now sitting up and able to walk short distances. 
There had been a constant stream of visitors to see her day 
after day. Near supper time, when all her callers had gone, 
Jim drew his chair up beside her and put his arm around her 

215 


2l6 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

as was his custom and told her the news of the day. “And 
now what will we do?” he asked. “I’m stumped myself.” 

“Let’s call in Mr. and Mrs. Story and our own folks 
and have a family council,” said Mary. “I can see it’s too 
big a question to settle offhand.” 

“Correct,” said Jim. “We’ll have them all here for 
supper. I’ll call them right now.” 

Judge and Mrs. Albright and Mr. and Mrs. Morton and 
Reverend and Mrs. Story were soon all seated in Jim’s 
parlor waiting the call to supper and Jim told them of 
the day’s happenings. The offer of the assemblage at the 
school house to endorse Jim for sheriff and help him get the 
nomination was a surprise to every one. “Now what will 
we do?” said Jim. “The way doesn’t seem clear to me at all.” 
There was silence for a moment for advice was hard to give 
in this emergency. Each one could see that there were many 
things to consider. 

“I see,” said Reverend Story, “that we all have doubts and 
unclear vision. Let us go where we are sure of a sympathetic 
hearing in all our troubled moments; to the Throne of Grace. 
I’m sure we cannot do wiser than ask God’s guidance.” 
They all knelt down and Reverend Story prayed shortly: 
“That they might all have the unlimited faith of Abraham of 
old to do the will of God and like him be prepared to follow 
the path of righteous action no matter what the personal 
sacrifice might be.” He asked: “That the spiritual might dom¬ 
inate their lives and works and that they might be led by the 
grace of God to see and know and follow their lode star of 
duty as unerringly as the Israelites in the lonely desert saw 
and knew and followed the flaming pillar of fire by night and 
the ever-present cloud by day.” 

“Now,” said Jim, “we’ll go in to supper and talk it over. 
I see clearer now than I did before. I know now that prayer 
can dissipate mists, and when the clouds between man and 
God roll away these troubles of this little earth seem such 
trivial things. We see tremendous problems even in this 
county till the prayer of faith opens the windows of the soul 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 217 

and we catch a glimpse of the measureless infinity of God’s 
great domain. Then our little difficulties shrink to their 
real size and importance. I guess we can handle them.” 

“ You remember when you put on soldier’s togs and went to 
Camp Lewis,” said Mary. “I consider this another en¬ 
listment.” 

“I take the same view,” said Judge Albright! “I was a 
soldier myself once. When you went to join the brigades 
of American soldiers at Camp Lewis you didn’t have to go. 
You could have claimed exemption and got it. The enemies 
of civilization were battering down the walls of civilization. 
It was the duty of every man of fighting age to go to the front 
and you went although you only got as far as a few months’ 
training in the home camp. We live in a world where there 
are noxious weeds to be destroyed. It is the duty of every 
man to destroy them. We live in a world where there are 
tigers and wolves and ferocious beasts. It is the duty of 
every man to destroy them. We live in a world where there 
are individual pirates and robbers and murderers and crim¬ 
inals, who have placed themselves outside the influences of 
civilization and make war on it. It is the duty of every 
man to stay their criminality by any necessary force. We live 
in a world where there are kings and emperors and dynasties 
and peoples who cold bloodedly and with malice aforethought 
educate themselves for generations into the belief that might 
is right, that oppression, robbery, and murderous piracy of 
other peoples and races are ethical. 

“The Germans so educated themselves from Kaiser to peas¬ 
ant. They assailed civilization. The Kaiser and the Princes 
and the Vons and the Herrs and the business man and the 
farmer and industrial laborer and the farm laborer and the 
monarchist and the socialist advanced against the citadel of 
righteous life that the world had built up in twenty centuries. 
Let it be said that our German-Americans did not go with 
them. The old-world Germans all united as one man. 
They seemed an invincible mass formation of organized, 
drilled, educated murderous pirates. 


2l8 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

“Their object was to make the Kaiser Emperor of Europe; 
to extend Germany along the English Channel; around the 
Baltic and down to India; to validate the German as the 
conquering warrior race; to pay every German warrior and 
every German government expense and every German mili¬ 
tary expense, present and future, from the tribute wrung 
from their slaves in France and Belgium and England and the 
other non-Germanic countries and later from this America. 
Every German was to be a warrior; the greatest fleet ever 
built was to be the German fleet. German uniformed mili¬ 
tary swashbucklers would march along the sidewalks of 
Paris, London, and New York, four abreast, and any citizen 
of France, England, or America who didn’t swerve off to 
one side into the gutter and salute the German eagle would 
be run through with German swords as a regulation blood 
offering to the German militaristic code of honor; and German 
princelings would take their stations in the capitals of the 
world and summon kings, prime ministers, and presidents to 
their ante-chambers and tell them in guttural, curt words of 
command to deliver so many francs, pounds, or dollars, the 
Kaiser’s assessment of serfage, at the city of Berlin, the capi¬ 
tal of the world. 

“You did right in enlisting to beat back by any force 
necessary these international brigands whose sole inspiration 
was international pillage and whose system of ethics glorified 
abhorrent military murder. And I believe to-night you are 
justified in enlisting again to beat back the unholy national 
and international forces that are assailing our local and state 
and national structures. They have educated themselves in 
personal liberty, the individual above the law. They are 
organized and drilled. They are attacking in mass forma¬ 
tion. Their object is to defy our constitution and our laws 
and to wreck them if they can. They are brigands out in 
the night to do their dirty work. If they circumvent the 
law they hold a carousal of rejoicing. They have educated 
themselves to illegality. They acknowledge no moral code 
or ethical code. Murder is ethical in their code if the dena- 


219 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

tured alcohol they sell only brings the big price. They are 
outside the bounds of reason or persuasion or compromise. 
Like the wolf of the plains or the tiger of the jungle they 
can only be handled by force.” 

“I agree with you,” said Reverend Story, “that this is a 
righteous cause and it is clearly every citizen’s duty to do 
that which comes to his hands.” 

“I think the proper thing to do,” said Mr. Morton, “is to 
accept and go ahead but if I mistake not there are lions in the 
way. This endorsement by the meeting is not an election to 
the office nor even a nomination by any means. My experi¬ 
ence with this direct primary system of nominations is that 
it’s a soul killer; kills off the real good men through dis¬ 
couragement and from the first startoff it’s a long way to 
Tipperary.” 

“Tve been studying the old-time convention system of 
nominations in comparison with the present system because 
it comes up in our night school classes,” said Mary. “I’m 
quite an expert in politics now, at least I am in my own 
mind.” 

“Tell us the difference between the two then,” said Mrs. 
Story, “for I’m somewhat ignorant although I hate to own 
up in a big crowd like this.” 

“The theory of it is simple. Under the convention system 
the county was divided into precincts and the city into wards. 
A precinct was a small portion of the county like a big school 
district. When an election was coming on each party had to 
have candidates so each party called a convention to be held 
in the city. Each precinct sent a certain number of delegates 
to this convention and so did each city ward. A big precinct 
or a big ward sent more delegates than a small one. When 
all the delegates met in the convention they nominated their 
candidates and adopted a platform of party principles. The 
names of all the candidates were printed on the election ticket 
and at the election each voter voted for any candidate he 
wanted elected. This was a representative nominating sys¬ 
tem. The voters, instead of all going to the convention, 


220 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 


voted in their precincts to delegate their vote to three or four 
neighbors and the votes of these three or four were counted 
in the convention as the votes of the precinct. If the voters 
of any precinct wanted any particular candidate nominated 
they instructed their delegates and they so voted in the con¬ 
vention. 

“ But in this direct primary system there are no conventions 
and no delegates. The primary nominating election takes 
the place of the convention. Any one who wants to be a 
candidate for any office gets a certain number of voters to 
sign a petition for him. Then he goes out and canvasses the 
voters of the county. At the primary election his name goes 
on his party ticket and if he is the high man in that election 
his name goes on the general election ticket two months 
later as the candidate of his party for that particular office.” 

“If I remember right,” said Mrs. Story, “the voters in an¬ 
cient Greece all met in the market place and elected their 
officers. I think the same system is in vogue in Switzerland, 
perhaps with some modifications.” 

“Yes, but we can’t do that because there are too many of us. 
When our government was organized the representative 
system was adopted and the convention system is the rep¬ 
resentative system. The voters are represented by their 
delegates in nominating the officers and later they are rep¬ 
resented by the officers elected'” 

“I was rather stuck on the theory of this direct primary 
when it was being adopted and I fought hard for it; but I 
wasn’t a candidate then and I see things somewhat differently 
now,” said Jim. 

“If you were a candidate for this office under the old sys¬ 
tem,” said Mary, “you could wait till the delegates were 
elected from each precinct and ward and then in a few days 
you could go round and tell them of your candidacy and see 
what your chances were in the convention. But under this 
direct primary you have to see every voter in the countv and 



tell them what you stand for. The platform 


adopted in the convention told them that and you wouldn’t 



221 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

have needed to see them all. It’s an awful expense for the 
candidate and I don’t see how you can afford to do it.” 

“I’m inclined to think you’re right, Mary.” 

“And then, Jim, if you’re nominated in the primary as the 
Republican party candidate you have to fight the Democratic 
party candidate in the election and you have to go out and see 
all the voters again. It’s an awful ordeal for a poor man to 
face. It will take six months and an impossible expense. If 
we had the convention system your party would take care of 
most of your canvass for the office and make your fight.” 

“I can’t do it unless I can depend on the neighbors who en¬ 
dorsed me to help out considerably.” 

“But, Jim, in this direct primary a candidate gets no help 
from anywhere. There’s no party responsibility as there was 
in the convention system where a party platform was adopted 
and each candidate stood on that platform and the party 
backed him up. In this direct primary each candidate adopts 
some party name but each fellow makes his own platform 
and tells each voter what that platform is and fights his own 
battle all the way through. The neighbors will be very 
enthusiastic up to the point where they sign your nomination 
petition and then what’s everybody’s business is nobody’s 
business and they’ll all go about their daily work and leave 
you to make your own campaign. A candidate is a sort of 
a public supplicant all the way through. The party name 
is a fake because the party doesn’t take any responsibility; 
it’s all the individual. He’s a sort of a political orphan going 
round with his hand held out begging for political alms. It’s 
humiliating for the candidate if he’s a self-respecting in¬ 
dividual.” 

“I think Mary is right,” said Judge Albright. “To be a 
direct primary candidate a fellow must either have lots of 
money and nothing else to do except play politics or have 
newspapers at his command or be a crank with a wooden head 
who is working along certain lines or be one forced into the 
field through a sense of duty. I believe thaf’s your case; 
that it’s your bounden duty to make this fight for the sake of 


222 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

American citizenship. If you go into it heart and soul you 
can’t lose because even if you lose you win.” 

“I take the same view,” said Reverend Story. 

“And so do I,” said Mr. Morton. “Someone must act as 
standard bearer for the law-abiding public. It’s going to be 
some mixup for I can see the force lined up against us. They 
have unlimited money and there are no infants among them. 
They know the game and have every incentive to play it to 
the limit. I believe they can be beaten and it’s up to us to 
try to beat them even if we fail. We and the little crowd in 
the vicinity here will help you all they can.” 

“And what?” said Jim, turning inquiringly toward Mary, 
leaving the question unfinished in words. 

“Fight!” said Mary. 

“Til accept,” said Jim thoughtfully. “The road seems 
plainly marked out for me. But I’m oppressed with a sense 
of completest loneliness. Here I am going out to do battle 
for certain fundamental American principles. I am to be the 
standard bearer if successful; to be at the forefront of a great 
party; yet I am alone. I would be backed by an irresistible 
force if I were nominated in convention with a ringing plat¬ 
form. The party is here; it is united on these principles; but 
it has no means of saying so. It is tongue tied by law; it is 
prohibited from voicing its thoughts, its wishes, its declara¬ 
tions, its commands, its militant spirit as a party. The infec¬ 
tious earnestness of the party multitude that grows and 
strengthens as they march under their party banners is lack¬ 
ing. As a candidate I can see clearly that the direct primary 
nominating system is the assassinator of party and without a 
party a candidate is surely a homeless waif. How am I as an 
individual stranger in the big city and the far country to 
make my individual platform known to the other individual 
stranger I find there? I feel that to-morrow I am sailing 
with all canvas spread into a zone of calms. My only con¬ 
solation is that my opponents are also becalmed and as help¬ 
less as myself to get anywhere. I’ll accept the offer of my 
friends.” 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 223 

“ Let’s see what means we have at our command/’ said 
Reverend Story. “We have the house-to-house canvass and 
the newspapers and circulars. That’s about all I can think 
of.” 

“I believe that’s all,” said Judge Albright. 

“Well, we’ll consider them,” said Mary. “It would take 
over a thousand dollars to put a little printed circular into 
the hands of most of the voters in the county. Newspapers 
have space to sell, not give away. They will give us some 
little notice free but not much. A house-to-house canvass 
means that not over one quarter of the voters will be reached. 
A strange voter who would receive the little circular would 
probably glance at it and throw it on the floor of the post- 
office or in his own waste basket. If he read it he wouldn’t 
know much more about Jim than he does about the man in 
the moon. One fifth of the voters will read the free notices 
in the newspapers and pay but little attention to them. The 
handshaking campaign is about as unsatisfactory as the 
others and it costs money. But we have to do the best we 
can and we can bear each day’s grief when it comes. We may 
be thankful this is not a state campaign.” 

“I guess we can, too,” said Jim. “The silver lining shows 
up around the dark cloud if you look at it that way. What 
dubs we were in our advocacy of this direct primary. If the 
dreams of us political theorists of that day could only come 
true or if we could only keep on dreaming how happy we could 
be!” 

“I think,” said Mrs. Albright, “we’ll have to make some 
allowances for the imperfections of human nature. If we had 
the perfect individual voter the perfect direct primary theory 
would work perfectly.” 

“True,” said Jim. “My problem is to deal with the im¬ 
perfect voter and a considerable part of her is in the kitchen.” 

“Yes, and the kitchen is conservative in its kitchenly way,” 
said Mary. “And it’s very prejudiced in favor of this very 
direct primary because it’s as much afraid of the big boss 
as it is of an energetic little mouse scurrying round on the 


224 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

floor. Either of them can be put out of business with a club 
and a little courageous mental energy but the kitchen prefers 
to be timid and keep at a distance from both and it will be 
a long time before femininity allows the men to go back to 
boisterous conventions. They’re too noisy and horrid, just 
like wrestling matches and water polo parties. We women 
want our politics nice and low voiced and well mannered 
and so-called practical politics will always be tabu in the 
kitchen for the kitchen loves theory and dotes on ideals. 
A dim, indistinct ideal along the uplift line of lingo with a dim 
indistinct halo hovering over it, as all real ideals are decorated, 
is what the kitchen secretly adores. It doesn’t make any 
difference whether there’s any common sense in it or not. 
The dim ideal and the halo are the things. If it had enough 
common sense in it to be visible it wouldn’t be an ideal and its 
charm would be gone. Theoretic perfection and practical 
imperfection are sure signs of the blue ribbon ideal. This 
direct primary is one of our kitchen ideals and so not a word 
against it or you’ll be tagged by the kitchen as a would-be 
boss or a practical politician, which is the same thing.” 

“All right,” said Jim, “I’ll be a diplomat; a silent listener 
on the direct primary. To-morrow morning I’ll notify our 
people that I’ll accept their offer and make the fight.” 

* * * * * * 

While Jim and his people were thus planning there was 
another meeting going on in which the trend of the conversa¬ 
tion would have been interesting to them if they could have 
heard it. 

Lew Delker’s office had become the central rallying point of 
the liquor campaign where the interested ones met. 

“What’s the latest this morning?” asked Red Barth as he 
drew a chair up to a table in Delker’s office, leaned back, and 
elevated his feet on the table edge. 

“ Big Jim Albright is sure to run for sheriff on the Republican 
ticket for one thing. His petitions are on the way to town 
now. Nothing much stirring yet elsewhere.” 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 225 

“I hear a good deal about this Big Jim Albright. Has he 
any strength ?” 

“Some, yes. A good deal when you come down to it.” 

“Is he prohibition straight?” 

“Straight as a straight line.” 

“Hard to reach?” 

“ Prays night and morning. Means it, too. Can’t do any¬ 
thing with a man like that. Takes his religion seriously. 
A regular Cromwell ironsider. Puritan and yet a good 
fellow. Enjoys a joke. Is highly popular, something of a 
public speaker. Very respectable connections. Has no 
past. Family. Nice wife. Is a good farmer. Hasn’t 
much money but may make a hot run. He’s the one man in 
sight to be afraid of. We can’t handle him if he’s sheriff.” 

“Kill him off in the primary, sure?” 

“That’s our aim. Don’t let him get as far as the general 
election.” 

“He’s straight, cantankerous prohibition you say. We 
can put up a dozen straight prohib candidates, strong men, 
too, in all the different geographical centers and we can 
have one woman candidate for sheriff. The novelty of it 
will appeal to a lot of foolish women who might vote for Big 
Jim.” 

“That would be a good idea. We can hold our own wo¬ 
men. They’ll do as they are told. Most of the women are 
against us and any votes that would come from their ranks 
for our woman candidate would be pure gain. It would be 
votes off the opposite side. The right kind of a woman 
would get a lot of votes. Other women would vote for her 
just for the oddity of the situation. Prohibition is not 
exactly an ideal of the women as a whole, anyway. The 
women are against whiskey mainly because they want 
homes; not because they’re anti-whiskey. They want 
homes above everything else on earth and the saloon inter¬ 
fered with home building so the respectable woman antag¬ 
onized the saloon and to put the saloon out of business she 
had to put whiskey out first. If men hadn’t built up noisy, 


226 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

disreputable saloons, just between you and me, and con¬ 
gregated there, it might have been different. 

“If they had done their drinking quietly and goodman- 
neredly in their own homes I doubt if one half the women 
would be one tenth as strong for prohibition. There’s a lot 
of women, a whole lot of them, who are proud of their hus¬ 
band, when he goes round with a cigar in his mouth, and a 
legion of women wouldn’t object to him getting tipsy in a 
gentlemanly way. It would be masculine weakness; a van¬ 
tage point to be used when necessary. 

“The fellow who could sip his toddy in the days bygone as 
a gentleman should was accounted by multitudes of women a 
generous, good-hearted, manly fellow who wouldn’t be mean 
in a mean way. If he whipped his wife one day when he was 
drunk he would make her an elegant present the next day 
to make amends. He was looked on as a man of the world 
and the girls liked him better than his puritan friend who 
never threw his money round in handfuls. 

“But the intuition of the respectable woman saw that 
either the noisy, garish, disreputable saloon must go or the 
home must suffer and she organized to war on the saloon 
and struck at its foundation, whiskey, to be sure she would 
hit the saloon. It wasn’t through reasoning on their part or 
really hatred of whiskey. It was intuition. It was anti¬ 
saloon in reality because it was pro-home. If we put out a 
woman candidate a lot of these women will forget all about 
any political issues and vote for her because she is a woman.” 


CHAPTER XVI 


W E SHOULD have a fair-minded survey of this law¬ 
lessness,” said Jim to two or three of his neighbors 
who were on the local committee to get signatures, 
“so that something practical can be done about it. Talking 
is no good. It takes action, constructive action. Suppose 
we organize a little committee of three or four and put/in one 
or two days looking the field over and see for ourselves just 
what is and just what is not being done. There’s nothing 
so truthful or so illuminating as just a plain fact and we can 
get the facts without any trouble except to put in some time 
and pay out a few dollars apiece.” 

“Good enough, but how will we go about it?” 

“Why,” said Jim, “I know Cal Dawkins since he was knee 
high. He’s been a newspaper reporter for three years in the 
city now and he knows all the ropes. He knows the city and 
the country and all the people and just what they do and how 
they act. I can get him probably to put in one day with us 
and show us around. Four of us, five dollars apiece and all 
his expenses. That’s cheap.” 

“Call him up, Jim, right away. We’ll wait for you to get 
his answer.” 

Jim went to a ’phone booth and after talking returned. 
“We meet him in half an hour at the junction. We’ll take 
your machine, Everett, it’s better than mine.” 

In half an hour the reporter drove up to the junction and 
after exchanging greetings said: “Now, Jim, what is this 
thing you want me to do?” 

“We three country fellows want to get a look at the 
whiskey trade just as it’s carried on in its ordinary, every-day 
natural way. We want to do this quietly, just for our own 

227 


228 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

satisfaction. We don’t know where to go ourselves, who to 
see, or how to act to get the most comprehensive view of it. 
If we go blundering round ourselves we won’t see half of the 
whiskey situation and the half we miss will be probably the 
half we really want to see. We don’t want to drink or carouse 
ourselves. We want you, as a fellow who knows where to go 
and when to go and what to see, to pilot us around for one 
day. We each pay you five dollars and your expenses. Can 
you go?” 

“Yes, to-morrow only though. That’s my day off, and I 
can’t go any other day.” 

“Good, we can be on hand any hour you name.” 

“Meet me at the courthouse door at three P. M. That’s a 
good time to start. We’ll quit about two o’clock the next 
morning. And now,” as he threw an appraising glance 
around, “each of you be sure you put on your every-day 
clothes and each bring along a small flask of cold tea and 
better have also a small empty flask. You may need them for 
camouflage if you don’t want to do any whiskey drinking. 
I’ll show you how some of the other half lives. Now, I’m in a 
hurry! Three p.m. sharp, at the courthouse door!” and he 
jumped into his auto and drove off. 

Just before three o’clock the next day Jim and his party 
drove up and found Dawkins waiting. “We’ll go out and get 
breakfast,” he said. “At least we’ll go and get my breakfast 
for I’ve just got up after working all night. I suppose you 
folks have put in a full day already but this is my morning 
and so goes the world.” 

Dawkins led the way to a restaurant and they went back into 
a corner. “Good morning, Della,” he said to the waitress 
who came up smiling. “Bring us each some poached eggs 
on toast and coffee and bring me just for myself an appetizer 
of something or other, you savvy, something or other, in 
fact, Della, you can leave out the other and bring me an ap¬ 
petizer of something.” 

“All right, Mr. Dawkins, just something is the proper 
name,” said Della as she went away, laughing. In a mo- 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 229 

ment she returned with a full liquor glass that she set by his 
plate. 

“It’s fine stuff, boys, real Johnny Walker from across the 
sea,” said Dawkins as he held up the glass to the light. “At 
least, the labels on the bottles say so but you can’t trust labels 
any more. There are printing establishments as big as the 
finest equipped job office in this city that are printing forged 
booze labels and all other sorts of fake booze printing. You 
can buy labels for any kind of booze that has ever been on the 
market so perfectly printed that they are as good as the 
genuine. Or you can buy the empty bottles with the labels 
on them or you can buy the bottles full of fake booze with 
the fake labels on them. Now I’ll pour this stuff into this 
little empty flask I’ve brought with me for the purpose as 
soon as Della goes out again for another order. I usually 
take an appetizer here in the morning but I’m going out 
with you and I’m not going to do any more drinking than 
I have to. I may have to do some later for appearance’s 
sake.” 

“It’s part of the regular trade here, then?” said Jim. 

“Oh, yes, to the customers who are known. They try 
to get good stuff here and I suppose they do most of the 
time. A lot of fellows drop in here just for their drink 
and order a little lunch of some sort as a blind. The girls 
are very wise and it would be hard to fool them much. 
It’s wonderful how wise these girls get and how they protect 
their employer when necessary. That girl Della is a mind 
reader.” 

“How extensive is this whiskey trade?” 

“There are whiskey zones. Every city in the United States 
to-day is a whiskey zone by itself. Some of the cities like this 
have overlooking officials, fellows who look over the tops of 
the houses and see nothing. These cities are pretty wide 
open. Some of them again are less wide open and some of 
them are pretty well closed, not altogether barren and dry but 
almost so. It depends on the officials. Out here in the 
West the booze now is three sorts: There’s the genuine im- 


230 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

ported European liquor. It’s bootlegged in by sea and land. 
There’s only a very small amount of that brought in now 
for it can’t compete with the fake stuff. Why should a boot¬ 
legger or a bootlegging syndicate handle genuine Scotch that 
cost big money when he can buy wholesale an exact imitation 
of it in taste and color and bottle and label for one quarter the 
price of the real liquor? He’s in the business for the money 
and he’s not a fool. Then there’s the American real whiskey 
that was sealed up in the government bonded warehouses 
when the prohib act took effect. That has been stolen or 
withdrawn under fake permits and fake excuses and shipped 
into Canada and bootlegged back. That has almost dis¬ 
appeared. The fake liquor, fake bottles, fake labels, have 
run these genuine brands off the face of the earth. Then 
there’s the moonshine that’s made in Canada and bootlegged 
in and the moonshine that’s made right here, some of it out 
in the woods, some of it in the city cellars. No man can buy 
whiskey now and know he’s getting what the label says. 
The thing is impossible.” 

“Is there much country drinking?” 

“Very little. The present generation of youngsters out 
in the country are growing up in entire ignorance of whiskey. 
And in the cities where there’s law enforcement ninety-five 
out of a hundred people don’t know there is any whiskey 
traffic except as they read about it. It’s the five to ten out of 
a hundred who keep up the traffic and create all the fuss. 
Where the law is enforced, or tried to be enforced, only the 
fellow who goes hunting for it can find it. Even here, where 
it’s almost wide open, it’s the ten per cent, who keep up the 
trade. The great majority of the people don’t know anything 
about it. Probably ninety million of the people of the United 
States are going about their daily labor oblivious of whiskey. 
They don’t see it, drink it, or know of its existence themselves. 
Ten million are close enough to it to see there’s something of 
a whiskey traffic and perhaps drink a little surreptitiously. 
The remaining ten million are the whiskeyites. They boot¬ 
leg and they booze. They create and keep up all the ferment. 


231 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

They are law breakers, all of them, criminals, and most of 
them have given up some other line of criminality to take up 
the whiskey criminality. ,, 

“How about the East and the middle states?” 

“The East is the worst. There they have an open-wide 
world on three sides for the buccaneers to congregate in and 
organize and carry out schemes of invasion. There’s un¬ 
counted capital and great foreign liquor industries backing the 
battalions of whiskey criminals there. It’s an international 
game and the criminals up to the present time have had the 
best of it but they are being checked and will be exterminated. 
Any gang of law breakers can beat the United States for a 
little while but no gang of law breakers can beat the United 
States longer than a little while. 

“The Middle West is much like the West. There’s the 
bootlegger from over the border to the north and the south 
and the moonshiner at home with his little still. The cordons 
are tightening around whiskey, however, drawing closer each 
day. There’s no whiskey here now except criminal whiskey 
and this criminal whiskey is doomed to die in five years. 
It was tried for attempted murder, for the attempted murder 
by malice aforethought of our American social, industrial, 
and political structure. It was found guilty by a majority 
verdict, sentenced to death, put in the death cell and the 
death watch guard put on. It continued its devilish work in 
the death cell through its own ingenuity of criminal device but 
it is now on the scaffold. The noose is slowly tightening, the 
cavern-jawed monster is beginning to strangle and gasp. 
The giant-muscled hand of the law of the land has a firm hold 
on that rope, has closed on it with a grip of steel and is steadily 
pulling. Behind that steadily pulling hand is the irresistible 
strength of the right arm of this great nation and the in¬ 
vincible, inflexible will of a hundred million determined 
Americans control the arm and hand and the united voice of 
the hundred million says: Tull’. When the bells ring and the 
whistles blow and the people shout to welcome the new year 
of 1930 whiskey will be as dead as King Tut’s mummy and 


232 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

this nation that knew it once in all its grotesque accursedness 
will know it no more for ever.” 

“I see they sell here,” said Jim. “A dozen glasses have 
come out since we arrived but they seem to work under wraps. 
It isn’t open and aboveboard.” 

“No, there’s no open and aboveboard selling in this part 
of the world. There may be in New York but not out here 
nor anywhere except where there congregates big bunches of 
whiskeyites such as you find in the few big Eastern cities. 
In the rest of the country the law breakers all work with some 
secrecy. These people are safe in selling because the coun¬ 
ty authorities wink at it and practically say, ‘go ahead,—we 
won’t arrest you.’ But no county authorities can give the 
whiskey sellers a license and the permission is only good while 
it lasts. It may be withdrawn any minute if some influence 
hits the present authorities a decided whack over the head. 
These people here must protect their protectors by breaking 
the law as secretly as possible and all the whiskey traffic is 
carried on as you say under wraps except in very odd cases 
and for a very limited time.” 

“How much do you pay for that glass of liquor?” 

“Fifty cents. That little glass costs as much as the rest of 
my breakfast. Whenever you see a fellow get a drink now 
by the glass you can figure that there’s the price of a meal 
gone.” 

“Somebody gets a profit of some dimensions?” 

“Ordinary booze by the bottle sells here at fifteen dollars 
per quart or sixty dollars per gallon. When a resident of this 
city buys a quart he pays over three days’ work for it. This 
money is wasted. He doesn’t pay it for shoes or clothes or 
groceries or hardware or lumber or wages. It doesn’t go 
into the legitimate channels of any industry where it benefits 
the community and the fellow who buys it gets a quart of 
poison for his three and a half days’ hard work. This 
economic loss is one of whiskey’s tragedies. Now let us go 
out and take a daylight look around. Then after night 
we’ll begin our real education work. I’ll do all the paying now 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 233 

and you see I give a generous tip. Any one who can afford 
to buy whiskey can afford to tip the waiter.” 

“And who does the city headquarters’ handling of this 
liquor?” 

“All this liquor comes in here either in caravans by auto or 
launches or hid in railroad cars. There’s the office of the 
fellow who is credited with being the big‘Noise’ in the whiskey 
traffic in this surrounding district. He is credited with 
‘seeing’ the railroad crews, the revenue officials, the auto 
drivers, the moonshiners, the bottle peddlers, the auto 
peddlers, and the big buyers. He sees the proper people, 
directs the flow of whiskey, apportions the percentage of pay 
to each group, and collects on the wholesale sales. He deals 
generously. It all comes out of the fifteen-dollar-a-quart 
sucker in the end. There’s a pretty regular wage rate. A 
railroad crew gets a divvy of so much per man for shunting a 
certain car on a certain siding. The auto drivers get so 
much for going to the dark side of it and unloading the 
whiskey. The revenue man gets so much for overlooking the 
load, provided he’s in on the game. He won’t be let in un¬ 
less it’s necessary for these fellows have their own customs 
seals and their own experts with their forged seals. Lew 
Delker there is credited with being the connecting link be¬ 
tween the big reservoirs of supply in Canada and the many 
little reservoirs of distribution on this side, and I guess the 
credit is deserved. Lew isn’t slow himself. That’s one of 
his autos just ahead of us. We’ll follow it and see where it 
goes.” 

They followed the indicated auto for a few blocks. It 
turned into an alley and stopped behind a brick block. The 
driver took out a package which looked like a hamper and 
went up the back stairs. 

“Drive round the block,” said Dawkins. “We’ll pick him 
up on the other side when he drives through. He was deliver¬ 
ing a case of liquor to the Breezy Club there. That driver 
has a high-toned list of deliveries to make. He guarantees 
genuine liquors from Europe, charges a high price, and de- 


234 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

livers only to wealthy patrons. Clubs and business houses 
and wealthy individuals are on his list. He makes regular 
rounds.” They followed him when he came out of the alley. 
He drove direct to a fashionable residential district and 
stopped in the rear of a large mansion. “He’s one of the 
leading society physicians and has a fifty-thousand-dollar 
practice,” said Dawkins. 

The delivery auto stopped farther along and another pack¬ 
age was taken in at another fine residence. “He’s a leading 
realtor and away up in the Chamber of Commerce,” said 
Dawkins. “We might follow this driver on his rounds day 
after day and we would find him making these deliveries 
every day in the year. He always goes to the back door, 
works under wraps. These clubs and high-toned wealthy 
drinkers are flouting the law and helping all they can to ridi¬ 
cule it and make it ineffective. They are not criminals al¬ 
though in the criminal game along with criminals. Their 
example and encouragement gives the bootleggers the back¬ 
ing they want. They are connected with respectability when 
they deal with these people and they appreciate the endorse¬ 
ment. It gives the bootlegger a standing and recommenda¬ 
tion. These people help to make the law a joke and any law 
that’s a joke has lost its usefulness. If some official would 
swat these jokesters just one good violent swat they would 
right about face like a drill squad on the parade ground. 
It’s coming to them and they’ll get it sure.” 

“They’re the example the single bottle lumberjack points 
to.” 

“Exactly; he says, ‘well, if these rich men’s clubs can have 
their stocks why can’t I have my quart bottle?’ and he is 
right.” 

* “Now let’s go in here.” They stopped before a great brick 
building covering a block. A gold-lettered sign over the 
main door said: “General Hospital.” Autos were parked in 
front and doctors and medical attendants and visitors were 
going in and out with a sprinkling of nurses in uniform. They 
went into the main hall and Dawkins went into the superin- 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 235 

tendent’s office. Presently he came out accompanied by a 
nurse. 

“Come!” he said. They went up in the elevator and along 
several hallways. The doors were all open and they could 
see patients on their cots and beds in all stages of hospital 
life from newly broken limbs and tossing delirium to con¬ 
valescence, where it seemed as if they were only resting and 
reading to pass the time away. They entered a large ward. 
Here there was a long row of cots with men stretched on them. 
Each man had his eyes bandaged. “Moonshine blindness,” 
whispered Dawkins. “Denatured alcohol’s work; thirteen 
of them in a week.” Just then another cot with a young 
man on it was carried in by attendants. A doctor and a 
nurse accompanied it to the far corner of the room. Beside 
it walked a white-faced woman of perhaps fifty and two weep¬ 
ing girls of fifteen and thirteen. “Gee, it’s Clem Stofer,” 
exclaimed Dawkins. “What a shame! that boy never took a 
drink before in his life probably. I must see.” He walked 
over to the corner and stood beside the boy’s mother as the 
doctor took the covering from his eyes and proceeded to make 
a hurried examination. Presently the doctor and the group 
came away. 

The woman was tearless but mental agony drew her features. 
“Doctor, is there hope?” she whispered tremblingly as they 
reached the hall. The girls stopped weeping and bent for¬ 
ward to hear the answer. Their faces were blanched and they 
seemed not to breathe as they leaned toward the physician. 
Never had any one of the men seen such anxiety as they saw 
in that little group. 

“Much hope; he will recover his sight but it will be slow. 
How much did he drink?” 

“Just one drink. It was pure poison. I don’t see why such 
poison is allowed to be sold. Clem said several of the boys 
took a drink with him and I suppose they are all blind.” 

“They may not have been affected as much as your boy,” 
said the doctor. “This denatured alcohol is peculiar stuff. 
Some it kills quickly; some it blinds permanently; some it 


23 6 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

blinds temporarily; some it makes ill for the time being. 
Its effects are variant and whimsical but always the man who 
drinks it plays with death or perhaps worse. It’s as danger¬ 
ous as a rattlesnake. The fumes of it even may have the 
most detrimental effect in some cases. Your boy is one of 
the lucky cases. His blindness will be only temporary.” 

“Thank God for that!” said Mrs. Stofer fervently as she 
recovered her calm and the girls smiled through their tears. 
“What a terrible thing it might have been. Clem is only 
nineteen and this is the second time he ever touched liquor 
in his life. He was out with half-a-dozen others on the 
beach and a bootlegger sold one of the boys a bottle. I 
suppose they all thought they would taste it and this is the 
result. But we’re surely thankful it’s no worse. I fear for 
the other boys now.” She and the girls hurried away with 
brightened faces. 

“Doctor, how many permanent cases of blindness are 
there in that ward?” asked Dawkins. 

“ Six, with two doubtful. This makes fourteen altogether in 
eight days. About half the cases seem to be denatured 
alcohol. The rest are moonshine. The moonshiners are dis¬ 
tilling rank poison now in their haste to get rich. Fifteen- 
dollars-a-quart whiskey is a powerful inducement to make and 
sell any kind of poison. I just had a fatal case, young man, 
moonshine whiskey, paralyzed his nerve centers just like 
cobra poison. There’s no way of combating it when it gets 
a hold and it takes hold at once as soon as it’s drunk. It’s a 
traffic in murder, just murder.” 

“You have seen one room where the modern liquor dealer 
is showing his handiwork,” said Dawkins as they went out. 
“But in all over these liquor-accursed districts this same 
tragedy is being enacted and there are hundreds of cases that 
are never heard of outside their own neighborhood, mostly 
single men living in rooming houses. Now we’ll go down 
to where whiskey is sold in bottles at a great rate.” 

They went into a big pool room that stretched across a 
block and faced on two streets. There were thirty or forty 


. BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 237 

tables and several drinking bars and many side rooms. The 
tables were all engaged, noisy groups playing all kinds of pool 
and billiard games. The side benches along the walls were 
crowded with men and boys, loafers they mostly seemed, and 
the card tables in the side rooms were surrounded by players 
of all ages. There was no money in sight but at the end of a 
game money changed hands and cigars and drinks were sup¬ 
plied. 

“This is the headquarters of a lot of little peddlers,” said 
Dawkins. “See that fellow with the long coat? He’s got a 
bottle and a glass in each pocket, sells by the drink in an alley 
or a doorway or any place he can find a buyer or he supplies 
a whole bottle if it’s needed. There’s a score of them work 
from here. That doorway to the left in the middle leads to 
the liquor cache. No one gets in there except the initiated. 
There’s liquor of all kinds furnished these tables but every¬ 
thing is done in an underhand way. The customers and the 
waiters understand each other thoroughly. Here’s where the 
lumberjack who doesn’t care particularly for whiskey and 
isn’t hunting for it in particular is liable to find it anyway. 
This is a working man’s resort, his club as they put it, and 
really he has as good a right to club it here as the wealthier 
fellows have in the big brick up street.” 

“Is this part of Delker’s chain establishments?” 

“Yes, he supplies it wholesale here. I suppose this firm 
buys by the carload. This place is better than a mint. 
Protection is furnished, and they protect their protectors by 
never getting too gay. We’ll walk through and go out on the 
other street. I see here a dozen fellows I know to be peddlers 
and who do nothing else. See that red-headed rooster over 
there. That’s Red Barth, supposed to be the head and front 
of the dope peddlers. He’s a dope fiend himself, was a 
bright, intelligent business man once, they say, now a wreck. 
There’s probably twenty dope fiends here who get their sup¬ 
plies through him. Dope and whiskey go hand in hand. 
Whiskey leads to dope in the case of highly strung people. 
There are criminals here, too, many of them, but they are 


2 3 8 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

good while here. The proprietors don’t allow any funny 
work around this establishment. There is a truce between 
the criminals and them. The house says: ‘You can come 
here but while here you must be decent.’ The criminal says: 
‘It’s a go/ and he behaves himself while in this house. Now 
we’ll go into this restaurant across the street.” 

It was a restaurant nearly as big as the pool room; a 
middle-class place with a tremendous patronage. A counter 
with seats ran along one side and tables with waitresses al¬ 
lotted to each two or three stretched away in the distance. 
“We’ll go away back and sit down,” said Dawkins. “Here, 
boys, I’ll let you order,” and he passed them a bill of fare of 
unusual length. “May, you might bring us just one white 
apiece, along with that consomme for four,” he said to the 
waitress. The waitress smiled, nodded, and left for the rear. 
“All the waiters are girls here. I guess they’re easier 
handled. Don’t booze so much while on duty,” said Daw¬ 
kins. 

“Do any of them drink?” asked Jim. 

“Oh, yes, most of them take a drink now and then and some 
of them quite regularly. It’s forbidden by the house but the 
girls don’t mind that. They have chances to drink and they 
take them. I’ve seen more than one waitress stewed here. 
Since the war the city girls have taken a long step toward 
dissipation. Society sanctions women smoking openly and 
drinking liquor privately and the girls here are no excep¬ 
tion. They’re no worse than the club women I’ll show you 
later, nor as bad.” 

The waitress returned with four glasses of white wine and 
four bowls of soup. She got their order and left again for the 
rear. “I ordered this as a usual appetizer. Empty it here 
in my flask if you don’t want to drink it or put it in Jim’s 
flask. I don’t want to fill mine too early. We can get a 
whiskey or any other drink if we want it later.” 

“How’s this, you’re working in the afternoons now, May?” 
he queried when the waitress returned with the dinners. “I 
thought you had the night shift at the rear tables.” 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 239 

“I had but three or four of the girls got half seas over 
yesterday and sassed the boss and he fired them so I had to 
come on here temporarily.” 

“Well, it’s better working in the daytime, isn't it, than on 
the graveyard watch from midnight till morning?” 

“ Not for me, give me the graveyard every time. Of course 
it's more healthful to work in the afternoons and a fellow 
doesn't get so sleepy eyed, for I never could sleep well in the 
daytime if I worked nights, but there are other advantages 
that make the graveyard the much-desired shift.” 

“More tips, is it?” 

“You bet, one bunch half drunk or whole drunk at two 
o'clock in the morning will pan out more for the waitress 
than all the people in the afternoon. I've a lot of old hens 
in here in the afternoon and they're no good. Women are 
stingy and a waitress is a servant to them. Give me the men 
after the theatres close.” 

“You mean when they bring their girls in for a feed?” 

“Exactly! A man with a few drinks in him at two a.m. 
and his best girl looking on is a prince, at least he is in his own 
mind and has to act like one to carry out the part. The same 
fellow that will give me a dime tip in the forenoon or pass me 
up altogether will fling down a five after midnight and say in a 
lordly way, ‘keep the change, girlie!"' 

“The graveyard means more money then.” 

“Yes, indeed. All the old girls want it. If I can't go back 
on it I quit; that's all.” 

“Well, the women are drinking more, too, now aren't they?” 

“Oh, my, yes. You ought to see how some of the dames 
swill after the theatres. It shocks even me and I’m pretty 
hard boiled. Why, they get dead drunk. A woman can't 
stand liquor like a man. They're more nervous, more high 
strung, easier stimulated to high nerve tension. A man will 
take a few drinks and become more talkative or more quarrel¬ 
some or more something but he keeps his body and mind 
balanced. His nerves or brain doesn't run away with him. 
A woman will take half the number of drinks and she flies off 


2 4 o BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

the handle. I see girls take one drink here and their eyes 
glitter and their faces flush and they’re as nervous as a dope 
fiend who hasn’t had any morphine for four days, and they’re 
erratic, too, need watching, laugh and talk and carry on 
without a bit of sense. The liquor goes right to their heads 
and they’re nutty little fools all at once. A girl who takes 
even one strong drink is in danger, I tell you. Her self-con¬ 
trol is gone.” 

“Don’t you have to drink with these night crowds to show 
that you’re a good fellow?” 

“Sometimes I almost have to. You know the fellows 
who are half seas over are awful generous. They’re enjoying 
high life themselves and they want everyone else to drink 
and enjoy high life with them. Every night some bunch 
tries to force me to join them in drinking. When I first went 
on at night I did take a few drinks which some generous 
bunch of fellows who had their girls along forced on me along 
with big tips but since I saw the effects of whiskey on other 
girls I quit. Nothing doing now for me in the swill line. I 
just cut it out for I know no woman can drink strong drink 
like a man and keep her poise. She’ll go to pieces in one tenth 
the time although she may think she’s as strong and brave and 
can stand as much alcohol as any man; and I know the after 
effects on the women are a hundred times worse than on the 
men. Their nervous makeup doesn’t get back to normal 
after swilling liquor like a stodgy man’s does. Whiskey is a 
woman’s natural-born enemy and besides that it makes her 
flabby fat and I’m going to treat it as an enemy myself.” 

“Well, you can smoke. I’ll bet you have a package of 
superfine cigarettes up your sleeve now.” 

“No, I haven’t, and I’m not going to have. I did try it 
and got along amazingly well with smoking; could smoke like a 
veteran. Then I noticed the same thing about tobacco that 
I saw in whiskey only to a lesser degree. Smoking is hurtful 
to women, much more so than to men. Men smoke because 
they get to enjoy it; women smoke because it’s a fad; because 
they want to do the things that men do; because they want to 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 241 

show their independence; because, as one woman put it 
yesterday when talking to her friends at this very table, ‘we 
want to celebrate our new freedom , ; just as if getting drunk or 
puffing tobacco smoke in public or in private either for that 
matter of it was a wonderful method of telling the world that 
women had gained some new freedom. Women don’t care 
to smoke for the smoking itself. They just naturally don’t 
like tobacco and it doesn’t agree with them. I remember 
my mother went to visit her uncle in Kentucky once. It 
happened they had a houseful and were short of room and in 
the room given her upstairs the uncle had hung some to¬ 
bacco to dry. Say, Mother came away from there in four 
weeks a nervous wreck, just the odor of that tobacco; and I be¬ 
lieve the same thing would kill any woman. At any rate, I’ve 
seen the effects of smoking on women here night after night 
and I’ve quit. I let the society buds do the smoking. I’m 
only a working girl and I’m not strong enough to smoke.” 

“Well, say, May, I’m going to ask you straight out for 
you’ve had a chance to see and hear: What of the morals of 
the drinkers?” 

“Young man,” said the girl as she looked straight at him, 
“when a girl gets half drunk and I know how easy she does 
that, because I have seen that sometimes one drink of whiskey 
will make her half drunk, she is irresponsible; has no more 
morals than a Chinaman who doesn’t know what American 
morality is. That’s femininity in a nut shell. 

“I detest this graveyard waitress work for one reason; be¬ 
cause I see and hear so much that no decent girl should see or 
hear when whiskey is being slopped around: and I’m as decent 
as the average. I need the money, however, and the grave¬ 
yard is where I get it. If it wasn’t for the whiskey you 
couldn’t hire me to work graveyard because there would be 
no tips in it at all. You couldn’t get tips out of sober men 
and women at that hour. It’s the whiskey that brings out 
the tips and the more whiskey parties and the more carousals 
the bigger the tips. That’s why I’m for whiskey and why all 
our girls are for whiskey and why the waitresses’ union fights 


242 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

for booze like a female tiger fights for her young. The cooks 
and waiters and waitresses and the stewards and all the 
caterers are for whiskey for the same reason. It means divi¬ 
dends so we’re all yelling for the drink. If it weren’t for the 
dividends we girls would be the soberest prohibs in all the 
prohib army for it’s not natural for us girls either to booze or 
to associate with booze. Naturally we’re inclined to be good 
and to line up with morality. We’re doing something un¬ 
natural and what would be repulsive if it weren’t gilded with 
golden tips.” 

“Sometime you’re going to quit and be real good?” 

“I’m good now but I’m in bad company most of the time. 
You bet I’m going to quit sometime and be good. And say,” 
she continued with a laugh, “I’m going to marry the nicest, 
best, lovingest, manliest, honestest, soberest fellow in this 
town when we’ve got money enough saved up. I’ve got 
him already picked out and we’ve agreed that when we’re 
married we’re going to join the prohibs and fight booze till 
it’s knocked out colder than Dempsey knocked Firpo, so 
cold that it never will rise again or show life. My choice 
young man is as big and strong and honest looking as 
our friend here,” nodding toward Jim, “and that’s going 
some.” 

The girl and everybody laughed so long and gleefully at 
this that other girls came running up to enjoy the fun but it 
was a secret among the company. 

“Well, May,” said Dawkins as they rose to go, “here’s the 
bill and a five-dollar tip toward that wedding savings. We 
didn’t drink the slop wine. Here it is in this flask. We just 
came in to look around. We’ll see you again sometime per¬ 
haps. Ta! ta! till we meet again.” The other men bowed 
to the girl as they left. 

She stood and looked after them with a puzzled expression. 
“Gee, I wish I knew who they are. I talked to that crowd 
like a house afire. I never talked to any other crowd like I 
did to them; told them everything; straight and honest, too. 
Well, they’re all right whoever they are.” 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 243 

“Now we’re through with the daylight part of our sight¬ 
seeing,” said Dawkins. “The night views will begin at the 
dance halls about ten o’clock and then we’ll take a look in at 
the road house. That will end the day for us. I’ll meet you 
at the place where we started and meantime you can look 
around. You can take it for granted that all the catering 
people are booze helpers, just as the waitress said they were. 
By catering people I mean that class whom the public pat¬ 
ronizes for convenience or fashion’s sake and who look for tips 
for their services. The public chauffeurs and many of the 
private drivers, the barbers, the porters of all descriptions, 
hotel and railroad, the express messengers, the telegraph and 
telephone boys and the regular messenger boys, the bellhops 
at the hotels and all the other classes of public attendants are 
practically all in the whiskey ring as private sales agents or as 
direct sympathizers with the fellow who is looking for a drink 
and is presumably free with his money. The foundation of 
the whole traffic is easy money. Now you can look around 
till we meet later.” 

“I’m taking you to this dance hall,” said Dawkins as they met 
at ten o’clock, “not as a dance expose but to show you how 
the dances are used as an annex to the whiskey trade. It’s 
just a five-minutes’ ride and this is a so-called popular dance 
hall, patronized by everybody; good music, good floor, every¬ 
thing up to date but open to all the public who have the small 
admission fee. Good people go there and medium good and 
medium bad and a few bad. The management tries to keep 
the tough element shooed away and succeeds pretty well but 
not altogether.” 

The dance hall was the lower floor of a large brick block. 
An admission fee of twenty-five cents was charged at the door. 
A liveried door keeper ushered the people in. Attendants, 
young men and women in evening clothes, guided the pro¬ 
ceedings. Each dancer bought tickets and each ticket paid 
for one dance. The dance floor was railed off and all around 
in the outside space was a mob in motion. The balconies 
were full. It was an orderly and well-dressed crowd. “Hello, 


244 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

Harold,” exclaimed a girl of eighteen as she pushed her way 
from the dance floor and met a youth near the door just in 
front of Dawkins and his crowd as they entered and were 
looking around before deciding which way to go. “Got a 
mickey ?” she said. 

“You bet,” he returned as he took her arm and they moved 
off talking. 

“That’s an introduction,” said Dawkins. “A mickey is a 
hip pocket flask such as we have only there’s different stuff 
in it. That girl is a nice girl in a high-class milliner shop and 
the boy is just out of high school. He’s in his father’s archi¬ 
tect office and is studying drafting.” 

“And the mickey is one of the smart set’s necessaries, is 
it?” said Jim. 

“Exactly,scattered over this floor and around the room and 
in the near-by cafes are dozens and dozens of mickeys and the 
mickeys are pretty well emptied by midnight and the boys 
and girls, especially the girls, are pretty w T ell filled by the time 
the mickeys are pretty well emptied. That girl will have a 
glittering eye at eleven-thirty. Let us edge up to the railing 
and look at them.” They found a comfortable bench at the 
front where the crowd could not push against them and that 
was elevated so they could look over the floor. 

“See there are old people and middle aged and medium 
aged and young but no very young people,” said Dawkins. 
“The kids are shut out here. They go to other halls where 
the high school sets congregate. Most of these people come 
here in groups of from four to eight. That gives them a 
chance to dance without mixing with the crowd. Strangers 
here have to be introduced in order to get a dance. See that 
silver-haired old lady, at least seventy-five? She was a 
dancing teacher and she comes here to enjoy her favorite 
recreation. She swings around with that young fellow grace¬ 
fully and easily. There’s an elderly fellow, sixty-eight, if he’s 
a day, twostepping around with his young niece and keeping 
better time than nine out of ten on the floor. See that dozen 
people coming round the corner up here? They’re a group 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 245 

from one of the towns above, just dropped in here for an 
hour’s dance before they go home.” 

“Ah, there’s our girl and her friend Harold, the boy with 
the mickey. Her eye has a glint already. They’ve had a 
swig from the mickey over yonder in the dressing room. 
It’s not allowed but it’s done all the same. This is one of 
the old-time dances for the old-timers and they’re all in it 
but now it’s rung off. They get three short dances here for 
each ticket with a half-minute rest between. See, they’re 
filing out at an exit in the railing and a new crowd is pouring 
in on the floor at another entrance in the railing. There they 
go as soon as the first crowd is out the new crowd is started 
dancing. That’s efficiency; no time lost. 

“This is one of the new dances, no old-timers in this; just 
the fellows who have the mickeys and their girls for no old- 
timer would do such dancing. They’re all jazzers. See this 
young fellow here coming close to the rail? He’s a rousta¬ 
bout in one of the express offices and the kid girl with the 
freckled nose and the red bobbed hair is taking a course in 
stenography at a so-called business college. Little do they 
reck of the wide world’s cares and sorrows. They’re in their 
own particular chosen heaven right now and they wouldn’t 
trade their heaven for the joys of the real heaven above. 
He has his mickey. You can see the outline as he swings and 
now and then the cork. They’ve had their first drink. She 
has both arms around his neck and her cheek is against his. 
He has both arms around her. See, he slithers along in a 
hobbledehoy stunt like a cross between a horse with the 
stringhalt and a wounded turkey. He shambles along with 
bent knees and gyrates around in the swing, half limp and 
half stumble. His girl has some accomplishments of her 
own, too. She gets in that knee-buckling stunt you see every 
so often and she capers as he slithers. There’s no dancing in 
it. It’s just a throwback to the grotesque motions of drunken 
savages about the time they reach the reeling point but this 
couple are idiotically happy; as happy as the limited brains 
of natural-born idiots will allow them to be and they’re en- 


246 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

joying what the old lady said was ‘the new freedom’ and 
they’re not injuring any one and the management gets the 
money, so: ‘On with the dance; let joy be unconfined.’ 

“And here’s another couple. Look at that. Pavlowa 
doesn’t have anything on that girl in the activity line. No 
wonder she can cavort around so easily. She hasn’t much 
clothes on to weigh her down. They travel with a swing 
and do you notice the two-arm hug and the closeness of cheek 
are fundamentals of all these jazz dances. These jazz dancers 
should have as many arms as an octopus to do justice to the 
capabilities demanded. No two-armed fellow can do the 
job in all its completeness. Some of these girls approximate 
completeness with two arms but they’re experts. Follow 
the motions of that couple; bodies, legs, heads, bobbing, whirl¬ 
ing, slithering, sliding, up on toes, stamping on heels, jumping 
straight up and down, twisting around like eels in a glue pot, 
doing anything in the world but dancing; and that’s jazz and 
behind it all is the inspiration of the mickey. This is a picked 
crowd. That floorful would turn out a mickey a couple if 
they were searched this minute.” 

“Where do they get the mickeys?” asked Jim. 

“At the cafes mostly. It’s a specialty trade; a small flask 
that the youth can slip in his hip pocket. They charge from 
two to four dollars for them but one of these young en¬ 
thusiasts would give his whole month’s wages for it rather 
than be dubbed a dead one by the girls. That’s the limit of 
the vocabulary of objurgation of these young, flashy femini¬ 
nities. When they label a young fellow a dead one he’s lost 
face, caste, standing, reputation, almost character; his social 
status is smirched across with a big black line; he’s a dead one 
and there can’t be anything deader. Up and down and 
around the cafes all the whiskey traders are selling mickeys 
at this hour, all privately, of course. All the dances get their 
share of these bottles and the auto joy rides of twos and fours 
of the younger set; and much is the liquor drinking from nine 
p.M. to two a.m. all along the route of city life. Go out now, 
up and down, and drink gurgles in all directions. The law 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 247 

forbids it, the officials permit it. A strong arm and a clear 
head would sweep these phases of the traffic off the face of the 
earth. 

“Now I’m going up to see the chef in a club near by. He’s 
connected with the cooks’ union and I want a statement from 
him in regard to a news item for to-morrow’s paper. One 
of you can come with me, if you wish, and get a look at the 
club kitchen where we’ll meet him. There’s a society dance 
on to-night at that club but we’ll not take part in the ball.” 

Dawkins and Jim made their way out, went down the 
street half a block, turned in and went up an elevator and 
back through a hallway to the kitchen of the club rooms. Jim 
stood and looked around while Dawkins got his statement 
from the chief cook. It was a very complete kitchen with two 
cooks and other help. Now and then a glance could be got 
of the ballroom floor through the swinging doors where men 
and women in evening dress were dancing. A number of 
the club members and several of the ladies came in while they 
were there to see the chef and give orders or suggestions. Bot¬ 
tled goods scattered around showed that wine and other 
drinks were probably on the bill of fare. As soon as Dawkins 
got through they left and hunting up their companions went 
out to their automobile. 

“We’ll take a spin out to a favorite road house now,” said 
Dawkins. “It’s the last and the worst but it’s only one of 
its kind. There’s many of them. When we see one we see 
all. A road house is a night resort. In the daytime they 
have little trade. Night parties make it a paying adjunct 
of the whiskey traffic. If there were no nights and no whiskey 
there would be no road houses.” 

They drove to the outskirts of the city and halted near a 
large building that had autos parked near by on all the streets 
and in and out of which a continuous stream of well-dressed 
humanity poured. They entered a large basement and 
Dawkins led them to the far side where they had a view over¬ 
looking the entire room. He gave an order and the waiter 
brought glasses filled with liquor. Dawkins paid for it, giving 


2 4 B BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

a liberal tip to the waiter who pocketed it without any thanks. 
When he was gone the liquor was emptied and the cold tea 
was substituted, making the same appearance in the glasses. 

“You see this is a restaurant, at least in name. There’s a 
counter with eatables piled on it and some cooks are at work 
there in the kitchen but the eating is subsidiary to the drink¬ 
ing. The drinking is what gives the profit. These tables 
are not built for eating on. If we order drinks we’re doing 
the usual thing and can hold our places. If we didn’t order 
drinks, but only lunches, we would be undesirable citizens 
and the waiters might step on our toes as they go by or any¬ 
thing might occur.” 

They took a look at the multitude that filled the big base¬ 
ment. The men were nearly all young. A gray head of hair 
could be seen here and there among the men but there were 
only a few above forty. The women were more unfortunate 
in age and appearance. Not many of them were over forty 
but lines covered by rouge could be seen and massaged 
wrinkles and complexions that were dissipation’s sign. There 
were about one quarter fresh faces and part of the balance 
had a youthful appearance but most of these younger women 
had a something in their expression that told of late hours and 
much worldly experience. Many of the women were extra 
smart in dress and splendidly jeweled hands were on all sides. 
If there was any cheap jewelry it was a first-class imitation. 
The woman without a diamond was rare and big brilliants 
were common in the arc light; some of them perhaps too big 
to be genuine. The men were smoking cigars or cigarettes or 
rolling the latter in most cases. In some cases the women 
were taking a clandestine pull at a cigarette; in other cases 
they were doing so openly. The ventilation was good and the 
smoke drifted away unnoticed. The place didn’t look good 
to the visitors from the country. These were not their kind 
of people. They were in a new world to-night and the sur¬ 
roundings were bizarre and uncongenial. 

“You see that lunch,” said Dawkins. “It’s in keeping 
with the place. There’s not an article in it that you would eat 


249 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

at your home. There’s cheese of a dozen kinds; all strange, 
strong, aromatic, costly stuff with a flavor that goes well with 
strong whiskey. If you don’t drink strong drinks until you 
are burned red inside you can’t eat it. If you eat it you want 
the strong, burning drink. There are sandwiches; half the 
inside of them is biting mustard and acrid pepper and onions 
soaked in vinegar and other hot unnameables that only the 
whiskey-soaked stomach can bear and demand. There are 
salads that will bite till they almost blister; and sauces for the 
cold ham and beef that are burning with red pepper and 
paprika and hotter things even than red pepper; and fish 
put up in various oils that would be detestable to the normal 
appetite. Everything is seasoned to suit the whiskey soak. 
Strong drink and this lunch menu go hand in hand. Now 
watch to-night and see how some of these bediamonded 
women eat these detestables. If their escort wouldn’t order 
these strong things, or even if he wouldn’t eat them, they’d 
set him down at once as a greeny and a dead one. The real 
sport is labeled and catalogued and casted in his own tough 
society by the kind of sauce in which he drowns his tender¬ 
loin steak. But there are no tenderloin steaks here. There’s 
nothing so substantial as that to eat. Nobody comes here to 
eat.” 

The visitors looked at the throng with growing interest. 
It was like looking at a play developing on the stage. They 
could see every move. Most of the women were at home 
now in ordering drinks; more so than the men, and took it on 
themselves to give special directions to the waiters so that 
they were brought a particular kind of the highly spiced lunch. 
One woman ordered a certain kind of flavor of caviar and sent 
the waiter back three times. She was drinking whiskey. As 
the caviar passed the visitors on the tray they looked at it. 
They couldn’t have eaten it to save their lives. She enjoyed 
it. Dawkins ordered some sandwiches. The men tasted 
them. They were awful; aromatic and pungent beyond be¬ 
lief; but the people around them were not ordering sandwiches 
as a rule; they were too tame. They relished better the 


2 5 o BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

strongly spiced meat and the pungent sauces. If cheese was 
ordered it was not the ordinary kind but some foreign make 
with a knock-down odor. At the beginning most of the drink 
was beer. A good many of the smaller whiskey glasses were 
to be seen but the crowd began on beer. The glasses were 
small and the lowest price noticed for anything was twenty- 
five cents. The amounts paid the waiters at each table ran 
into dollars every little while. 

A little later a woman came on a raised platform at one end 
to sing. She had a beautiful voice, slightly roughened by 
such nights as this but still wonderfully vibrant and melodi¬ 
ous. Her face had once been strikingly beautiful but now it 
had some hues and shades of color that were not exactly of 
nature’s make. Standing there on the high platform with her 
elegant figure at the end of her two splendid songs she looked 
like a handsome goddess. She came down on the floor and a 
man at a table near the visitors half motioned to a seat beside 
him. She sat down and leaned her elbows on the table. 
“We enjoyed your singing,” said he. “Won’t you take part 
with us for a minute?” 

She said, “Certainly, what are you all drinking, beer? 
Well, I’ve been over to the other joints singing and I began 
on whiskey to-night and I don’t believe I’ll change. I don’t 
think it’s good policy to change drinks when the night’s fairly 
under way.” 

A waiter brought her a whiskey glass and she drank it down 
without a quiver and the well-trained waiter, without another 
order, brought her another that she let stand temporarily. 
“You have a splendid voice,” said the man. “Don’t you 
find it very trying singing in these places where there is so 
much tobacco smoke and the air is so bad?” 

“Oh, dear, no! I like it here. I was in San Francisco in a 
little dump there for awhile that got me but these places are 
not so bad.” 

“Couldn’t you do better on the regular stage with your 
voice, though?” 

“No and yes. I did sing for a long time as a professional 


251 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

but drifted into this and I got used to it and there’s a certain 
amount of freedom about it and it pays well. I only have to 
sing a few times each night and I make a fine salary. That 
keeps me and my little girl; that’s her over there; just sat 
down; that’s my Marie.” 

The visitors looked and there was a beautiful young school 
girl, not more than sixteen, just seating herself at a table with 
a gay, beer-drinking, laughing crowd of young folks. She 
seemed to be a favorite with all of them. 

“Yes,” said her mother with pride in her tone, “Marie 
comes here when I sing but she doesn’t frequent these joints 
when I’m not on the program and she never drinks anything 
stronger than water. That crowd wants her to take beer but 
Marie won’t drink. She promised me that and she keeps her 
promise. I’m educating her musically and she’s making fine 
progress. It costs a pile of money, but what’s money?” 

Then she took another drink of half her glass of whiskey and 
told something of her life story. It included a splendid home 
in the East at one time; a school life of accomplishments and a 
marriage and divorce; poverty and stage work to make a 
living; thence to singing in cafes. It was interesting, and as 
she went along the man asked questions to draw out the in¬ 
formation that appealed to him. It was easy to see that she 
liked this life now because of the excitement and the strong 
drink. She was in splendid physical health and the drink had 
just begun to affect her. She hadn’t noticed what the lis¬ 
teners could see, that her singing voice was slightly husky now 
and that her face had begun to show telltale marks. Called 
to another table by a friend they heard her order more 
whiskey. Except for an unusual brightness of her eye and 
an easily noted recklessness of expression at moments no one 
could tell she had been drinking. 

But somewhat later the effects could be seen on nearly 
everyone within sight who clearly didn’t, as in her case, be¬ 
long to the habitual class. Many of the older women drank 
right along and never changed in demeanor. It was noticed 
these same women ate largely and it seemed as if the eating 


252 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

balanced the drinking; something afterward learned on in¬ 
quiry from Dawkins to be a fact; that if a drinker could eat 
large quantities of meat, especially fat pork, that whiskey 
had a much smaller effect on them; but when their appetite 
for heavy meats left them they went to pieces physically all 
at once. All the younger and fresher faced women and girls 
showed the drink effects much worse than the younger men. 
Their more delicate and finer fibred physical and mental 
beings responded quicker to its effects and their cheeks were in 
all cases unnaturally flushed and their eyes glistened and they 
were emotional; reckless in speech and unbalanced in action. 
Their wills were paralyzed, even those who had drank very 
little, and the extreme difference between the effects on the 
men and women was especially noticeable. In the late eve¬ 
ning there wasn’t one of these younger women that wasn’t in 
a mood for any daredevil recklessness that her men friends 
might propose. 

A female impersonator came on the little stage to do the 
usual act of his class. It was the cue for a ribald outburst 
and, curious as it seemed, the liquor in the brains of the audi¬ 
ence only added and gave point to the sentiment against him. 
To them he was something to be censured and they took high 
moral grounds in dealing with him; he was degrading and 
they resented it. 

One half-drunken, sharp-witted fellow close by kept up a 
running comment that was a fair echo of the general feeling. 
“Look at him,” he said. “He’s effeminate; he’s degenerate. 
I can laugh at the country boy who, to carry out a frolic at 
some country party or in some country debating school, dons a 
skirt and makes believe in a ludicrous feminine role. That’s 
a legitimate frolic with fun as its object but this thing, in the 
shape of a man; this grown-up disturber of genuine moral 
feeling and delicacy makes a serious business of it in vaude¬ 
ville and provides himself with expensive dresses and all the 
paraphernalia of femininity, particularly those articles of 
lingerie that are of the ultra feminine. It is one of the stand¬ 
ing delusions of one of these insane mentals that he can dress 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 253 

up in the finery of the woman of fashion or of the demi monde 
and with false wig and rouge and expansive made-up bust and 
trailing skirts pirouette out on the stage and sing sweetly 
when really it is a tone that is most exasperating because it is 
neither male nor female; and he thinks if he so struts and 
mimics and postures and reels off false falsetto that every 
man, woman, and child in the audience will hail him as a prima 
donna par excellence or a perfectly ravishing soubrette and he 
believes that no one can see that he is a very ordinary crazy 
fool of the genus Jackassicus superbus. 

‘‘That fellow has become so abnormal in his abnormality, 
in his degeneracy from sex and type, that he coxcombly con¬ 
ceits that he can outwoman a woman in her own sphere. 
Sure, there is only a few of him because among all the mil¬ 
lions of sane Americans no one can countenance a being 
half ass and half monster and among all the insane that 
crowd the institutions for the mentally afflicted not one 
in a million of the craziest of the crazy would descend to the 
level of this degrading and degraded female impersonator 
who performs so cunningly and so knowingly in this vaude¬ 
ville line to the disgrace of the program while I notice the 
women look with half-averted and the men with shamed 
faces. 

“Just look at him. He comes gowned in the rich materials 
that would grace a drawing room of refinement, his ears be¬ 
traying his kind; look at him go through his disgraceful and 
disgracing act without one remedial commendatory feature; 
not one flash of wit, not one word that paves the way to even 
subdued laughter, not one epigram, not one graceful act or 
line; nothing but the grimace and the strident falsetto and the 
hateful presence of the hateful thing that wiggles and waggles 
back and forward and, see him at the final yeowl of that high 
C note that was intended for an imitation, an exact imitation, 
of the finish of the song of the diva herself; pull that wig to 
one side and note the proud gleaming eyes look out from the 
shaven head that rivals the shiny and ogre-like head of the 
turtle when widest awake. 


254 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

“See, every attitude and every proud glance of the brain¬ 
less coxcomb shows that he thinks he is a star of the first 
theatrical magnitude and that the applause should come 
thundering from gallery and floor and box and the manager 
should there and then raise his salary to a sum commensurate 
with his important importance. Every time I see him and his 
kind I close my eyes and add this prayer to the ancient litany: 
‘From the female impersonator; the theatrical pariah; whose 
makeup is suggestively immoral; who degrades manhood and 
shocks womanhood, whose presence on the stage is socially 
vicious; may we be everlastingly delivered!’” 

The assemblage showed the actor far less consideration than 
he would have received in a regular theatre. Even with all 
their drawbacks they recognized a system of moral ethics that 
wouldn’t tolerate him. 

“I know quite a number of the men and some of the women 
here,” said Dawkins. “You see that young lady at the cor¬ 
ner table? She’s a stenographer. She has a single bedroom 
for a home and comes here, not because she wants to, but be¬ 
cause it’s unbearably lonely in her room. That gay young 
couple of women over there near her are two young married 
women from the hill residential district. They live in an 
apartment house. Their husbands are away, one in the East 
the other in Alaska. They have good husbands but they’re 
not now nor never were in love with their husbands. They’re 
like many other women who find an unrestrainable temptation 
in doing things that men do. They’ll leave their own clean 
kitchen and dining room and come down to this restaurant 
and eat these awful eatables. They hear that this cafe is a 
place where they can drink with the men and they quiver 
with excitement as they telephone to some unmarried man 
and make a date to come here to-night. More than three 
fourths of the women here at this hour have either made the 
date to come here by ’phone themselves or were the active 
party in the proposal being made. There’s a majority of 
the women here who can’t resist the lure of excitement that 
runs close to the danger line.” 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 255 

The crowd thickened and became more boisterous as the 
minutes went by. It was really a wildly drunken mass of 
people; especially the feminine part at midnight. There 
were glistening eyes and high-keyed sentences and outbursts 
of hilarity on all sides. At a few minutes to twelve the band 
stopped in the midst of a selection and a local politician, a 
well-known character, was helped on the stage and made a 
few maudlin remarks, chiefly about personal liberty. His 
finish was greeted by a yell that was as mixed and mingled 
a disordered sound as could be imagined. Men and women 
stood up and cheered and shouted and went wild. Some 
girls were helped up on the little tables and did a can-can 
dance. The tables broke down or tipped over and they fell 
into the arms of the surrounding revelers or on the floor; no 
one cared which. Other women stood on chairs with dis¬ 
heveled hair and screamed like maniacs. One woman, whom 
the visitors had noticed was of very decent appearance when 
they came in, deliberately began to tear off her clothes. The 
waiters carried trays of whiskey in all directions with surpris¬ 
ing alacrity and promptness for it was a harvest for them. 
Their tips were doubling and trebling and they could short 
change on all sides; nobody cared for such a little thing as 
small amounts of money. 

Beer had disappeared; whiskey, brandy, gin, wine, some of 
it champagne, took its place. In a quarter of an hour more 
liquor was drunk than in an hour before and the women were 
in a drunken frenzy and the men not much better; but a 
drunken woman is so much more noticeable and horrifying, 
that the visitors saw only a saturnalia of carousing femininity. 
The singer of solos was called on for another song but she 
loudly and profanely refused as she was having too good a 
time. She was just able to walk. The daughter, the pretty 
school girl who never drank anything stronger than water, 
raised a glass of amber-colored liquor to her lips. She had 
been persuaded to take just one. In ten minutes more she 
was the hilarious centre of her tableful of companions and 
her face was like fire and her eyes glittered. One drink had 


256 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

followed another and two had gone to her head. Another 
nice-looking young woman, a perfect natural blonde, with 
white teeth and a rose complexion, was now standing up hold¬ 
ing to a table trying to make a speech which nobody heard or 
cared to hear. She sank to the floor after swaying round and 
was carried out—where? The noise of shouting and laughing 
and din of mixed sounds was overwhelming. Two women 
got into a fight. One of them was she whose husband was in 
Alaska; the other a vixenish woman with rouged cheeks. 
They slapped each other fiercely. Then the vixenish woman 
caught the other by the hair and pulled her across the table. 
The drunken crowd yelled with delight and cheered them on. 
A policeman stopped the fight. The clothes of the Alaskan’s 
wife were torn, her eye was black, her mouth bleeding. She 
was led to the wash room cursing and shaking her head 
drunkenly. Every few minutes a policeman walked here 
and there through the crowd to keep them in some semblance 
of order. 

A drunken man seized a bottle of whiskey and poured it 
over a woman who had laid her head on the table before her 
and gone to sleep. She didn’t even raise up to object and all 
the onlookers laughed in sodden glee. Women and men who 
had never seen each other before gabbled and talked as if old 
acquaintances and two men had a fight because of too much 
familiarity with new-found women friends. The waiters 
were busier as the throng kept increasing from the outside 
and seats were no longer reserved. Nobody cared now *who 
took their seats. Two women, obviously strangers, stood 
near and vociferated: ‘‘What a glorious celebration it was!” 
Then they came over to the visitors’ table and wanted to 
shake hands all round. They-were both young and comely 
and maudlinly intoxicated. When Jim and his party 
wouldn’t shake hands with them they went and leaned over 
the counter and shook hands with one of the bartenders and 
gabbled to him. 

No one was arrested although the police led several, both 
men and women, out to cabs and sent them away to their 


257 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

homes and others were taken away by their friends, or sup¬ 
posed friends; perhaps their worst enemies. A party of 
three men, evidently observers and not participants, came 
and stood near the visitors’ table. They heard one say: 
“It’s the same at all these places. Some of the others are 
worse than this one at times. The women are getting worse 
than the men since the war turned things upside down mor¬ 
ally. If it didn’t make me so mad I’d pull out and leave but 
I’ll stay here and fight till we close these places.” They went 
away and a waiter pointed them out with a grin to a bartender 
as they went out the door. 

A rougher and tougher element began to crowd in, it 
seemed. The rouge that had been so thick on the women’s 
faces earlier in the evening was in many cases half washed 
away and added to the dissipated and ghastly appearance 
in the bright electric light glare. Faces began to appear 
that were so muddied in complexion that even drink failed 
to flush them and others that were so red at all times that 
whiskey couldn’t add any more color. Flashy vests and 
coarse jewelry was displayed by the men and women com¬ 
ing in at the last. There was a constant stream out but 
more entering and the crush and confusion and jabber 
was too great even for the band to smother now and 
they played only intermittently. The visitors bunched 
together and went out through the demoralized throng. 
A policeman, seeing they were sober, made a passage for 
them. The change from the air within to that without was 
heavenly. 

“Don’t let us get the wrong perspective on this traffic,” 
said Dawkins. “If you look through the big end of the 
telescope, as we have been doing, you see a great monster 
close up, staring you in the face. If you look through the 
other end you see a minute devil away yonder in the far dis¬ 
tance. Let us adjust our telescope. The real people of this 
United States are not manufacturing, bootlegging, selling, or 
drinking whiskey. The homes and families of the real people 
don’t know what whiskey is. The boys and girls of the real 


258 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

people don’t know what a mickey is. Some day soon the real 
people will take notice of this monster we have been looking 
at and kick him so hard that he’ll fly clear off the earth into 
oblivion’s space and never more be heard of except in the story 
books of the past.” 


CHAPTER XVII 


T HE weeks of the primary campaign fairly flew by for 
everyone. Jim was on the road every day, now in one 
direction, now in another. Mary generally went with 
him. The farm was managed by the folks. He was making 
an intensive campaign; seeing every voter as he went and 
taking the opportunity at some moment of his visit to bring 
in his political case and explain just what he stood for. He 
paid no attention to other candidates for he found out early it 
was a free for all and every man for himself. He was sur¬ 
prised at the number of prohibition candidates for his office. 
He ran across them everywhere. It seemed as if every two 
or three townships had a local candidate trying for the nomi¬ 
nation on his ticket. None of them had been encouraged to 
run by a promise of strong support. A few of them frankly 
stated they were ambitious to be sheriff* or needed the salary 
or were running because they thought they had a show. The 
others had been urged to run by their friends and neighbors 
and most of them seemed to have high hopes although Jim 
couldn’t see that any of them had more than a little local 
support. They were in the field, however, and it was a case 
where no one could tell what might happen. 

Jim met with much encouragement but it was slow, tedious 
work and very unsatisfactory for there was no key to the situ¬ 
ation. There was no party authority or guidance. He was 
an individual out making an individual campaign; supposedly 
as a party man but the party was nowhere in sight. He was 
discouraged with the sloppiness of his situation after the first 
two days but he doggedly pulled his hat farther down over 
his eyes and kept on going. 

Mary helped him out in many ways. She saw the looseness 
-59 




26 o 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

of the political machinery and saw his discouragement and 
rallied to his aid and looked and talked cheerfully even when 
it was difficult to do so as the eternal monotony of the routine 
canvass began to fatigue and court a listless mood and action. 
After they were out a few days Jim refused to go without her. 
“If you don’t go along I’ll never see this thing through,” he 
said one day and thereafter she went with him on all his trips. 

Other interested people had their troubles, too. One eve¬ 
ning when the campaign was two thirds over Lew Delker sat 
in his office, feet on desk, half-smoked cigar in his mouth, hat 
tipped down almost to the tip of his nose. Another of the 
Delker crowd had an almost similar position at another desk. 
Red Barth lolled in an armchair near the wall. They were 
the three remaining out of a large meeting of ward workers 
who had come in to make weekly reports and get wise to any 
new orders or new lineups. 

Red was there by virtue of his position; a confidential man. 
He was the loyal leader of the loyal underworld whose exist¬ 
ence depended on winning the election and who were ready 
to do anything they were told to do. Red had far more than 
ordinary claims to the inner circle. He was a dope fiend but 
he wasn’t a mere ordinary one. He was a university man. 
A brilliant career once lay directly before him. He had rec¬ 
ognized ability. He was the equal of any of the bright lights 
in the intellectual world around him in those days and there 
were yet the flashes of his former self when the dope was in 
abeyance for a short period. He was trustworthy in his 
former days and was trustworthy now in his responsibility. 

His controlled vote was large; far beyond the morphine 
and cocaine addicts. He was the director in the underworld; 
the shady, vice-protected men and women of no inconsider¬ 
able numbers who existed in the life of the city by sufferance 
and whose normal lot was to be chased from pillar to post and 
tagged and persecuted by authority but still allowed to live 
outside the jail; for which they were duly thankful. Their 
normal condition was that of the hunted fox that flees from 
one covert to another and then to another and they expected 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 261 

and looked for and asked for no other treatment. For the 
present Red Barth was their intermediary with the 
authorities. 

They always had and always expected to have someone who 
stood between them and the law. They had no standing in 
the legal or moral or decent society courts and asked none 
themselves. They were the outer caste, the pariahs, and 
their manager was an absolute boss. He told them to put up 
so much money each week and they did so. They might have 
to go cold and hungry, and often did so, but they always paid 
the fee that allowed them the privilege of living. They had 
no means of knowing who got the graft money or how it was 
divided or if it was divided. If the usual amount was doubled 
they paid it just the same. They asked no question; put up 
no kick. If the intermediary with the authorities said to 
them they could stay where they were located they stayed. 
If he told them to scurry out they scurried out to any new 
location he indicated like an army of wharf rats and again 
they camped for the time being; the most forlornly transient 
of all earth’s inhabitants; homeless outlaws in the centres of 
civilization. 

They were the human victims of disorganized social and 
economic systems. The warp and woof of the accumulated 
and overpowering miseries of their outcast lives was woven 
of perhaps long-past love and jealousy; far-reaching domestic 
woes; the discords of family life and broken homes; the cov¬ 
eted luxuries of the rich linked with the grinding poverties 
of the poor; the high cost of living; rigid social regulations; 
woman’s inhumanity to woman; man’s inhumanity to woman; 
the economic necessity of late marriages; the economic neces¬ 
sity of no marriage; the homeless home; the religionless un¬ 
restraint of the homeless home; and more potential than all 
the other items in the program of downfall and wreck and 
ruin of these men and women loomed up the deviltry of 
whiskey and light wines and beer and morphine and cocaine 
and heroin. 

A thousand elements, different in form and type and struc- 


262 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

ture and influence in our chosen social and economic systems, 
entered into conspiracy to make them the banished, forlorn, 
wayward, lost children of the socially and religiously great, 
cold, dismal, prison-locked, supremely miserable, window- 
darkened and soul-abandoned underworld. They were of 
these social and economic systems. They were cast to outer 
darkness as the ill-fitting machinery revolved. They clung 
to the outer fringes of the very systems that made them and 
from the blackness of the black night that enveloped them 
scourged with whips of nameless woe the very society that 
made them; that is their lord and master. These helpless 
wards of a helpless civilization were demon Retribution; 
active and swift and merciless as the pestilence that sweeps 
humanity’s multitudes silently to the grave. 

Red Barth, the brilliant dope fiend, the provider of dope to 
them, the straw boss of the whiskey supply to them, the 
chosen friend of Lew Delker, was their guide, their friend, 
their instructor, their master; for he was the confidant of Lew 
Delker, the man who stood in with the mayor and the city 
councilmen and the chief of police and the sheriff and the pros¬ 
ecutor and the big politicians. Red Barth wanted them all 
to vote in the coming election and they were going to do it 
for would not the vote of any one of them kill the vote of the 
president of the Y.W.C.A. or the president of the State 
Federation of Women’s Clubs or the vote of the mayor him¬ 
self or the most influential citizen in the city if he voted pro¬ 
hibition? “If you walk up Main Street any other day 
you’ll be arrested, but on election day all of you can walk up 
Main Street as if you owned it,” said Red to them. They 
were all ready for election for Red was an organizer and this 
night Delker had learned Red’s full plans for a sweeping un¬ 
derworld vote with high satisfaction. 

“How goes the fight on the outside?” asked Red. 

“Not so favorable,” said Delker slowly. 

“How’s that?” 

“Why this fellow, Big Jim Albright, is going to make all 
sorts of trouble. We need the sheriff and must have him. 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 263 

This big rooster breaks into our game and queers it. We put 
up dummy candidates all over the field to split the prohibition 
vote and it works all right till he gets out. He’s working 
from house to house and is a natural born vote getter. A 
company of his church people have organized to help him and 
are quietly persuading our dummies to withdraw. They’ve 
got three of them already. Every one of our dummy votes 
goes to Big Jim as quick as the dummy withdraws. Then 
we had a woman candidate out and she was a whirlwind for a 
week till a double husband story came from Iowa and she 
had to fade out. So it doesn’t look so awful bright in the 
sheriff line. We’re holding our own in the other contests and 
have a shade the best of it.” 

“The prosecuting attorney is as important as the sheriff.” 

“Yes, and we’ll either get our man, the man that’s in there 
now for a second term, or get a dogfall. If our man doesn’t 
win we’ll force the nomination and election of someone who 
will be with us in emergencies at least. That’s the kind we 
have now and he’s all right; does even better than an out and 
outer.” 

“That’s not so bad. How about the superior judge?” 

“Can’t say just yet. That’s a bad office for us to interfere 
with much. We expect an even break and will get someone 
who will be willing to listen to reason. Two of the candidates 
are interested in investments with our people and we expect 
more than just mere sympathy if some of our fellows ever 
come to trial up there.” 

“The other offices don’t count much.” 

“No, we’re not much interested in them.” 

“This Big Jim Albright may get the nomination, then?” 

“Yes, in spite of all we can do. He’s a campaigner out of 
sight. He makes a vote every time he shakes hands with a 
voter. I like the son of a gun myself.” 

“Buy him!” 

“Can’t be done. He prays night and morning and is sin¬ 
cere in it.” 

* Every man has his price.” 


264 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

“Big Jim is the exception.” 

“Kill him off, then.” 

“If he were hit with some sort of a scandal a week before the 
primary voting,” said Delker meditatively, “it might work. 
Truth never catches up with a lie if the lie gets the start. No 
explanation can be made in such a big territory in the space 
of time of the last few days. If he were hit he should be hit 
hard. No use of any love taps. Put him out of business 
while we’re at it. It can be done. There’s a big woman’s 
vote. What if he were queered with the women? Red,” 
said Delker more quietly even than he had spoken, “if a letter 
were written to the newspapers signed ‘ Mij ’ giving the women 
at the society ball fits for their semi-nudity and liquor drink¬ 
ing it might be a bomb that would explode.” 

“I believe I know a way,” said Red after both he and Del¬ 
ker had sat in silence several minutes. Delker looked at him 
interrogatively. “I’ll try it out and tell you more about it 
in a day or two,” said Red. “Do you know whereabouts Big 
Jim is to-night?” 

“In the southeast corner of the country.” 

“Is the wife and family with him?” 

“His wife is; he has no other family. They come home to¬ 
morrow morning.” 

“Who takes care of his house and farm while he’s gone?” 

“Their old folks look after the farm. The house is locked 
up when they are away.” 

“All right,” said Red as he went out. “I’ll try my scheme 
and let you know to-morrow night how it works.” 

He went out and started up the street. Two weasel-faced 
youths were standing listlessly on the sidewalk seemingly 
just passing away the time. As Red came out and started 
away they woke up suddenly. Their eyes brightened and 
they swung into step a half block behind him. They were 
alert and businesslike now. They neither gained nor lost 
space for the several blocks Red walked. He entered a stair¬ 
way leading up in a ramshackle old frame building in the 
center of the business district. A sign on the front said: 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 265 

“Rooming House.” The two youths quickened their step 
as he disappeared. They turned into the entrance of the 
same stairway and there stood Red waiting for them in the 
semi-darkness. “No more to-night,” he said in a penetrating 
whisper. “You had enough to do you till to-morrow. No 
more now.” Without a word the two cringed away. They 
were dope fiends with a whole night before them and no mor¬ 
phine. 

Red went up two flights of stairs and turned down a dimly 
lit corridor to the far end. He entered his own den and there 
spent considerable time writing two letters with a lead pencil. 
He again went down the corridor about halfway and unlocked 
a door and went into a large room. A number of young men 
and a couple of young women were there. On a couch a 
young man lay in deep sleep. Two others sat at a table and 
talked volubly in suppressed tones. Their eyes had the la¬ 
tent lusterof dope. The others were seated around in various 
resting attitudes, taking no reck of the world or what was 
going on. One of the young women sat at a small table. 
Her head was down on her arms on the table and her hair, a 
tangled mass of auburn, fluffed around her face. Whether 
asleep or not could not be told. The other young woman sat 
slumped in a small rocker paying no attention to anything. 
The two small incandescents cast a meager light around the 
room. The furniture and carpets and window draperies were 
old and worn and dirty and the room had the odor of the 
tomb. 

The two young fellows awake at the table ceased their 
whispered chatter and nodded to Red as he came in. “Where’s 
Jasper?” asked Red. 

“Down at the Montauk.” 

“Go down and tell him to meet me on the dark side of the 
street at Bay View Alley with the auto in fifteen minutes,” 
said Red in the same low tone they all used. 

“Has Louise Eventrate woke up yet?” Red asked. 

“Must be by this time,” said one of the young men. 

Red went over to the girl with the auburn hair whose head 


266 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

rested on her arms on the table and shook her. She only 
moved restlessly. Red shook her more roughly and she 
raised her head slowly. Her eyes had a stare in them that 
showed mind vacancy and she only gave the slightest glance 
of recognition and was settling down again but Red was in¬ 
sistent and shook her again till she sat up in the chair. 
“This,” said the young man at the table as he drew a flask 
from his pocket and indicated it to Red. Red took it and the 
girl mechanically took a sip which made her cough violently. 
Some of the light of awakened mentality came into her eyes. 
She was a very pretty girl, a perfect auburn blonde. “Louise, 
take another swallow,” said Red, and she did, with the same 
coughing results, but more mental awakening followed and 
now she recognized her situation. “Louise,” said Red, 
“where’s your typewriter and paper and carbon sheets?” 

“Up at Lil’s,” said Louise in a sleepy tone. 

“Well, waken up. I’ve got some work for you. Now get 
on your things and come with me. Here, I’ll help you. 
We’ll have to go to Lil’s and get your paper and carbons.” 

The girl arose and swayed around but the two young men 
held her up and got her coat on and Red produced a comb 
and she straightened out her mass of tangled hair and tied it 
in a knot and put her hat on. 

“Now one more drop, Louise, and you’ll be awake,” said 
Red. The girl pushed the flask away wearily but Red in¬ 
sisted and she took another swallow, They went out to¬ 
gether. The cold air helped to awaken the girl and after 
standing for a few minutes in the hallway near the front en¬ 
trance she was able to walk and talk. They turned into the 
next stairway, climbed one flight, and entered another room. 
No one was there. It was a one-room furnished housekeeping 
apartment and clothes, furniture, dishes, bedding, and eat¬ 
ables were littered around. Louise pulled a typewriter from 
under some clothes on the corner of the bed and found some 
paper and carbons. 

“We won’t need the machine,” said Red. “Take the 
papers and carbons. You wait here a minute till I come 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 267 

back.” He went down another corridor and knocked in a 
peculiar manner on a certain door three times in different 
places. Quietly the door opened half an inch. 

“Ferrett, bring your keys, we have work to do.” The 
wrinkled face with the sharp, blinking eyes, that was the only 
part of the room owner that was visible, took on an alarmed 
look. “No bull business,” said Red assuringly. “Just 
ordinary opening.” The face lost its alarm. The door closed 
gently and soon opened again as gently and a slight figure 
stepped or rather slid out. 

* * Jfc * * * 

The next evening Delker’s ’phone rang. “This is the office 
boy at the Daily Clarion ,” said a treble voice. “Mr. Bush 
would like to have you drop in.” 

“All right, I’ll be there in five minutes,” answered Delker. 
He went over to the newspaper office and walked into the 
editor’s room where he had made daily calls since the cam¬ 
paign started. 

“Here,” said Bush, without looking up from some proof 
sheets he was reading. Delker took the letter thus handed 
him and went over to the window and sat down to read at his 
leisure. It was a typewritten letter on plain paper addressed 
to the editor of the Daily Clarion , criticizing the wet campaign 
and campaigners and citing the actions and behavior of the 
city women at a large society ball of the week before as proof 
of the evil effects of alcoholic drinks. It was dated the day 
after the ball and mailed at a local post office near Albright. 
It was signed ‘Mij.’” It was in a plain envelope with type¬ 
written address. 

“Well, what do you think of it?” asked the editor as he 
threw the proof sheets on the desk and leaned back in his arm¬ 
chair. 

“Slanderous!” said Delker. 

“Sure enough! I can’t print it. It even mentions the 
names of the wives of some of our leading citizens as being 
hilarious, if not worse. Would you show it to the husbands? 





268 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

Why, all the society ladies in the exclusive set were at that ball 
and it hits them all and doesn’t even make an exception.” 

“ Certainly show it to three or four of the men. That’ll be 
all that’s necessary. They’ll tell their wives and their wives 
will be the newspaper that will publish the letter. In a few 
hours they’ll all know it. It makes first-class campaign 
material just as it is; will make every soul of them rear and 
pitch. Say, they’ll be the maddest bunch of people this 
world ever saw and the madder they get the more it’ll be in 
our favor. One real mad woman on election day, out in her 
war paint, will be worth twenty hired campaigners. By all 
means show it around. When did it come in?” 

“ Just before I called you. The night editor opened it first. 
He thought it was great stuff. Who did it?” 

“Search me. Where was it mailed?” 

“Let’s see; the envelope shows Cardon post office mark. 
That’s just this side of Albright, isn’t it? Is Big Jim home? 
He was out in the southeast yesterday.” 

“Yes, he’s home. Came home last night. Bennett saw 
him this morning out there.” 

“Well,” said Delker as he again closely scanned the paper, 
typewriting, envelope, and signature, “it’s a good enough 
‘Morgan’ for us. ‘M IJ’,” he spelled out; “reverse it and I 
spell ‘JIM.’” 

“You’ve hit my idea exactly,” said Bush as the meaning 
glance of the two men met. 

“Say,” said Delker earnestly, “don’t let this letter out of 
your office; don’t let it out of your hands except when you 
hand it to someone to read and only let three or four of the 
leading citizens read it. Keep it locked up securely in your 
private desk. Let it become known by retailment. You 
know what imagination does in a case of this kind as the news 
speeds along by the gossip route. Before three days this 
letter will be one that has unprintable things in it, personal 
things about our leading society women. Keep the real let¬ 
ter here and the imaginary letter will grow to be a monstrous 
thing and the more monstrous it grows the better for us.” 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 269 

“Good idea! I’ll just let three men read it and will keep 
it locked up. I can also run a five-line squib in to-morrow’s 
paper saying that such a letter has been received but that we 
cannot print the unseemly charges and insinuations made in 
it against the most highly respected ladies of the city.” 

“That will be good, very good, it will focus attention on the 
letter and give it a good start.” 

“How about investigating who wrote it?” 

“Leave that to the women and their husbands. They’ll 
do it much better; much more thoroughly than we can, and 
all we can do is to sort of guide the whirlwind when it starts 
and see that it skips over our barn and wrecks the other 
fellow’s. We have the inside track; so 'Let ’er go’ Gallagher!’ ” 

At this juncture the desk ’phone rang and Bush answered 
it. “Yes, he’s here. Hold the ’phone,” he said. “It’s the 
editor of the Weekly Current Topics; wants to speak with you.” 

Delker took the ’phone. “Want to see me regarding a 
letter? Say, is the letter regarding the ladies of the society 
ball of last week? It is. Then come over to Bush’s office. 
I’m there. We’ve got one of the same kind, I guess. Come 
right away and we’ll all talk it over.” 

In a few moments the editor of Weekly Current Topics , a 
sensational personal sheet, came in holding a letter in his 
hand. “A carbon copy,” said Bush as he compared the 
two. “The writer wanted to make sure that his ideas of 
things would get in print. Are you going to run it?” 

“Not if I’m in my right mind. It’s libelous and I’ve got 
enough accidental libel suits on my hands without intention¬ 
ally inviting others. I’m a man of peace myself and don’t 
want another dozen or two. ‘Blessed are the fellows who 
know when they have had enough,’ is the motto over my door 
and I try to live up to it in the matter of libel suits.” 

The three men talked over the situation as Bush and Delker 
had done and Stribling agreed that Current Topics would 
treat the letter as they had agreed on and that he also would 
run a short, emphatic notice regarding the letter’s contents 
and the reason it was not printed. Delker went to the office 


270 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

with springy steps and a smile on his face. He saw the possi¬ 
bilities and they grew in volume and importance as the situa¬ 
tion developed before him in a panorama of immediate future 
campaign happenings. 

Red Barth was sitting in the office when he went in and the 
full connection between Red and the correspondence flashed 
on him. “We’ve got a new element in the campaign,” he 
said to Red who was carelessly reading a newspaper and who 
paid no attention to the steady look with which Delker re¬ 
garded him. 

“Yes, what is it?” mumbled Red without looking up. 

“The Clarion and Topics have each received a letter about 
the society ball of last week and it may be very important 
later on.” 

“Yes, it’s society, is it? Well, society news doesn’t 
usually have much effect on a campaign,” again mumbled 
Red as he folded his paper more completely. Delker turned 
away without pressing the matter further and Red rose in his 
estimation as a safe man to trust with responsibility. 

The next forenoon he was walking back and forth in his 
office, his brain still busy arranging, re-arranging, building up, 
and tearing down probabilities in connection with the society 
letter when Bush called up: “Say, Delker, come over to my 
office at ten-thirty. I’ve called in Caledon, Smith, and Rey- 
land as a committee to see this letter. I want you and 
Stribling to be here and anyone else you may wish to bring.” 

He found Bush and Stribling and Mr. Caledon, a wholesale 
hardware merchant; Mr. Smith, a ship owner; and Mr. 
Reyland, an iron manufacturer, sitting in the newspaper 
office. “I called you gentlemen all in to show you a com¬ 
munication of some interest. I received this letter and Strib¬ 
ling received a carbon copy of it in yesterday afternoon’s 
mail. I’ll hand it to Mr. Caledon who will read it out loud 
for the benefit of all,” said Bush as he handed the letters to 
Caledon. Caledon adjusted his glasses and read it slowly 
out loud. At the conclusion of the reading there was an in¬ 
stant of perfect silence. 


271 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

“I called you gentlemen in because the names of your 
families are mentioned and I wanted to fully enlighten you 
first as to the letter,” said Bush. “It’s an outrage,” burst 
out Smith whose face had turned red and white by turns and 
now was a deep choleric pink. “It's an outrage. You’re not 

going to print that-,” the blank was filled by a gesture as 

Mr. Smith couldn’t find a word handy to designate the letter. 

“No, neither the Clarion nor Topics is going to print it. 
We turn it over to you; that is, we give you first-hand knowl¬ 
edge of what it contains but we want to keep the letter our¬ 
selves for safekeeping and for other purposes. It’s an impor¬ 
tant letter and as it’s short anyone can remember what is in 
it so you don’t need to take it with you. I’ll read it over 
again out loud so that we make sure everyone grasps all there 
is in it.” He read the letter the second time and it was lis¬ 
tened to with even more interest than the first reading. 

“When did you say you got it?” asked Caledon. 

“Yesterday at five-thirty in the afternoon. It came in the 
five o’clock mail.” 

“And where was it posted?” asked Smith. 

“The postmark is ‘Cardon’ and shows it was posted yester¬ 
day morning sometime before ten o’clock.” 

“Mij,” spelled out Calledon; “what might those particular 
letters stand for?” 

“It’s problematical,” said Bush. “You might get an ex¬ 
pert to look over the letter. He might see things in it that 
we don’t.” 

“Let me see the original letter and envelope,” said Delker. 
Bush passed them over. Delker examined them closely. 
“Why, the letters ‘Mij’ spell ‘Jim’ if reversed but they may 
stand for something else,” he said. “I have a suggestion to 
make, gentlemen, and that is that you call in Harrison, the 
typewriter expert, and have him look at this letter.” 

“Certainly, call him in at once,” said Reyland. “I’d give 
one thousand dollars to find the writer of this infamous screed 
and I feel grateful to you gentlemen for giving us a chance to 
investigate this thing before you printed it. My wife was at 


272 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

that ball and I consider it was a perfectly respectable gather¬ 
ing in the social line and very respectably conducted through¬ 
out. I’ll go to any expense or trouble that may be necessary 
to find this miscreant and punish him as he deserves.” 

“And I’ll add another thousand,” broke in Smith. “We 
can’t do too much or do it too quick to suit me. A fellow 
who would do such dirty work as that should be hung or 
driven from the country. He isn’t fit to live in a decent, 
civilized community.” 

“I’ll throw in a thousand, too,” said Caledon. “We must 
find him. Call Harrison and have him come over here now.” 

“Mr. Harrison,” said Bush as Harrison came in, “we have 
here a letter written by someone and we want an expert 
typist to look it over and tell us what he sees in it that might 
lead to the detection of the man who wrote it. First read it 
so that you may know clearly what is in it and why we ask 
you to give us the benefit of your expert knowledge.” 

“I see what you want,” said Harrison, after hastily looking 
over the letter, “and I see clearly why you want the technical 
details of the writing known. This letter was written on an 
Excelsior typewriter, number five. I’ll explain that I know 
this because each make of typewriter has a different type 
from other machines and it is even usually different from the 
type of other machines of the same name but not of the same 
number. Each machine is numbered by the manufacturers. 
They begin with one number, switch to another, and then to 
another; each number being some improvement on the pre¬ 
ceding one. This was written on a number five because it is 
clearly number five type. 

“It is an old machine and the letters are dirty. The ma¬ 
chine is not kept up by a regular typist. If it were the letters 
would not be dirty. The owner or user is careless in its care 
and probably follows some other occupation although this 
letter itself is very skilfully written. It looks as if it were 
written by an expert letter writer on an old, dirty machine or 
by an unskilled typist who took a great deal of care. I know 
the letters are dirty and the machine ill kept because the cir- 


273 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

cle of the o and the u and the b and the other letters are filled 
with ink and blot; they have not been cleaned out with a brush 
in a long time. 

“The ( n in this typewriter is not in line with the other 
letters. Each letter in a typewriter is on a stem of its own. 
The stem of the ‘n* in this machine has got bent a little and it 
throws the letter at a slightly different angle from the other 
letters. The ‘u’ in this machine is not exactly in alignment 
either. It is almost so but is not exactly so. This may be a 
very slight bend in the stem or it may be in the adjustment 
of the stem. The ‘o’ in this machine has a slight gash in the 
upper northeast corner. This shows in every impression of 
the letter and is undoubtedly a cut across the circle of the 
‘o’ at the upper corner. The capital letters are dirty and I 
should judge that the capital ‘E’ is defective in the lower half, 
in the cross bar, but there is only one capital ‘E* here so it 
may possibly be owing to the dirt in the letter. The ribbon 
used is a pink, a common variety of pink, but pink is not a 
common ribbon on the ordinary machine. Usually the ribbon 
is black or of a black shade. The carbon used to make this 
copy was new and a very good variety of carbon paper. The 
plainness and exactness of the copy patterned after the 
original shows this. I probably could find other things if I 
went into the matter more thoroughly but you can follow out 
for yourselves the line of investigation I have outlined.” 

“Tm astonished,” said Reyland, taking the letter again 
and looking it over. “I see everything you mention as plain 
as day but these things never occurred to me before. Typing 
is harder to forge than handwriting, I should judge.” 

“It certainly is to the inexpert. To the expert every 
machine speaks its own individual language as plain as printed 
language can speak and tells its own clear story. The man 
who uses a typewriter to forge with is the cleverest of criminals 
if he escapes detection. There are many more chances of 
getting away with it by forging handwriting.” 

“And what of the paper in that letter and envelope?” asked 
Delker. 


274 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

“This is a very rare paper,” said Harrison as he held it up 
to the light. “You see that mark through the centre?” and 
he passed the paper to Smith. “As plain as day,” said the 
latter passing it on. 

“That mark was put there by the Massachusetts manu¬ 
facturers on this particular brand of paper and it's a distin¬ 
guishing mark. It's like a Yale key; no other key fits. This 
is an elegant, finely finished paper, made years ago. I doubt 
if you can buy it now. Feel the difference between it and this 
common office paper. I don’t suppose there’s two bunches 
of that paper in this county right now. Probably where it 
came from is the only place it can be found. I should judge 
that paper was bought ten years or more ago. The envelope, 
too, is a high-class envelope, though it is commoner than the 
paper and of later stock. It may be that some one stationer 
or wholesale house in the city keeps this envelope but I 
doubt if more than one does. Its thickness and texture are 
entirely different from the ordinary envelope, as you can 
see.” 

“That’s a fine beginning,” said Caledon. “I feel we’re well 
on the way. Can we call on you again, Mr. Harrison, if we 
need some more advice?” 

“You certainly can, gentlemen. Call on me at any time.” 

“Good enough,” said Reyland. “We’re off on the right 
foot. It’s only a question of detective work now. This is a 
simple case, after all. We’ll catch the scoundrel now in no 
time.” 

“And when we do catch him there’ll be something doing,” 
broke in Smith hotly. “I’ll go the limit with him for my 
part.” 

“I have another suggestion to make,” said Delker. “It 
would be well to call up the county attorney and show him 
this letter and get an opinion from him as to what he might 
be able to do with this fellow after he is caught.” 

“Another good suggestion,” said Reyland. “It will give 
us a clear view from the beginning. The legal end of it may 
be in his favor. We’ll get the opinion at once as the matter 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 275 

may be in the hands of the prosecutor later. Will you call 
him, Mr. Bush ?” 

‘'He’s down below in the job room now, I believe. I saw 
him go in there to look over some legal proofs just a few 
minutes ago. I’ll call him up. Look over this, Bob,” he 
said as the prosecutor entered, “and tell us what you think the 
liability of the writer is from your standpoint?” 

“Clearly criminal libel,” said the attorney. “The writer is 
subject to a criminal prosecution.” 

“How is that?” inquired Caledon. “I don’t quite under¬ 
stand. This man writes defamatory letters to the press about 
ourselves and families. Do we not have to sue him if we 
want satisfaction in the courts?” 

“No, not necessarily. There’s a civil liability and a crim¬ 
inal liability. Where the libelous things said and published 
are of the character of this letter the writer can be arrested 
like any other criminal and in that case the state stands all 
the expense and prosecutes the case. If guilty the writer may 
be sentenced to a fine or imprisonment or both. It may be 
that an action may be begun also for damages after the crimi¬ 
nal charge has been disposed of. Your action along that line 
depends on the advice of your lawyer and your own feelings 
when the time comes. As far as I’m concerned, gentle¬ 
men, I was at the ball myself and know the heinous falsity 
of these statements and if this writer can be found I will 
take great pleasure in seeing that he gets all that is coming 
to him.” 

“Good! We’ll find him all right,” exclaimed Smith. 
“We’re on his track already.” 

“We would like to keep the letter for a short time to do 
some more investigating. When we get through with it we’ll 
turn it over to your office,” said Bush. 

“All right, gentlemen, call on my office any time. We’re 
at your disposal. Also the sheriff’s office will be. His wife 
and daughter were at the ball.” 

“Now it’s detective work as far as I see,” said Reyland. 
“The way seems clear. Let’s get to work at once. I feel 


276 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

like going out on the case myself. If money is needed to be¬ 
gin we’ll finance the preliminaries ourselves. ,, 

“I’m with you,” said Caledon. “We want to chase up 
this particular typewriter. Find the machine or his brand of 
paper or envelopes and we find the man. Also there was the 
mailing of these letters out there at the country post office; 
probably a short time before the stamp was put on the letter.” 

“The mail at Cardon comes into the city twice a day,” said 
Smith. “It leaves there in the morning about eight and in 
the afternoon at five. Probably the postmaster can give 
some information as to who might have mailed the letters; but 
the machine is the main thing. Let’s find this particular 
machine. We can have every typewriter in the city and 
country round of that make and number tested.” 

“I fancy it was written in the city and mailed in the 
country,” said Reyland. “The writer was someone who was 
at the ball for the exact location of the punch bowl is de¬ 
scribed.” 

“Yes, it looks like city spite work,” said Caledon. “It 
may have been some old cat who was sort of pushed to one 
side and is showing her jealousy or it may be some man who 
is a prohibition crank. I don’t know any of that class who 
were at the ball. Such fellows don’t generally go to society 
balls.” 

“I suggest that you put the whole matter in Harrison’s 
hands,” said Delker. He knows typewriters like a book; 
like a banker knows bills; and he’ll find this one quicker than 
all the rest of us and he is also an uninterested party and his 
testimony would be unprejudiced and without bias. He’s an 
expert and would want expert’s wages, but that’s only fair.” 

“We can do that right away,” said Smith. “The pay cuts 
no figure. Will you see him, Bush, for us, and get him to go 
to work on the detective end right away?” 

“Yes, and I’ll put a good man out on the Cardon end at 
once and see what we can find out there for sure. It may be 
that we can get some valuable hints there. Suppose you 
meet here this evening at seven-thirty and we’ll have a re- 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 277 

port of progress made by that time. Meantime, if anyone 
runs across anything of interest he can either let me know 
and I’ll put some one of our people on the trail or he can 
follow it up himself/’ 

“Correct,” said Reyland as they rose to go. “I feel im¬ 
mensely relieved for I know now we can catch the criminal. 
We’ll come back here at seven-thirty.” 

“Just one word,” said Delker. “It would be well to keep 
it an absolute secret among our half-dozen selves as to Har¬ 
rison’s work and our other detective work till we get results. 
You see what might happen to this particular machine if it 
became whispered round that we were hunting for a type¬ 
writer with these peculiar marks.” 

“That’s right,” exclaimed the three committeemen to¬ 
gether. “We’ll all be mum on that subject; as quiet as mice 
when the cat’s around,” said Caledon. 

“Let them do the whole work of investigation without 
a hint from us. They’ll find the guilty party, all right,” 
said Delker to Bush and Stribling when they were alone. 
The editors nodded their response to this and so it was 
agreed. 

There was a meeting of the society ball committee of ladies 
that afternoon to settle the financial and other business of the 
ball. The buzz of excitement over the letters to the news¬ 
papers overshadowed everything else. Everybody present 
had been informed as to what the letters contained by ’phone 
and otherwise and in turn had informed others. The tele¬ 
phone operators had heard more of that particular subject 
during the day than all other subjects combined that they had 
time to catch a word about. Whispering conferences passed 
along the particulars that the chain gossip couldn’t speak out 
loud and as nothing was taken away from the story and almost 
everything added that could be added by insinuation and 
shoulder shrugging the letters grew to be formidable literary 
monsters. The absolute lack of knowledge of who could have 
written them added the necessary mystery and overpowering 
curiosity to the conferences. Guesses were made in whispers 


278 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

and reasons given for the guesses but no one could give any 
guess that had any show of fact to back it up. It was notice¬ 
able that each guess as to the authorship had behind it some 
ill feeling arising out of past society doings so that they were 
shrewdly discounted as soon as made. The meeting was a 
whirling merry-go-round of excited, pointless suggestions and 
sayings and ended in the utter dissatisfaction of unappeased 
curiosity. 

At seven-thirty the committeemen were promptly on hand 
at the Clarion office and also a small array of other citizens 
who had kept track of what was going on and were on hand 
to do what they could in the way of a demonstration if noth¬ 
ing else. Bush opened the meeting by saying: “I have a written 
report here of the post-office detective as to all the happenings 
around the Cardon post office from eight yesterday morning 
till five in the afternoon, as far as the postmaster can re¬ 
member. He gives us a list of the people, as far as he can 
remember, who did or might have mailed letters. This list 
is of no particular value unless we have something connecting 
someone mentioned in it with the letter writing. I suggest it 
be not made public.** The report was handed to the com¬ 
mittee who read it. 

“There’s nothing tangible in it,** said Smith. “We’ll keep 
it and wait for further developments.** 

Harrison came late. He said: “I have nothing to report 
at the present time. I have been at work since morning and 
I ask for more time to finish up what is on hand.** He was 
told to go ahead and leave nothing undone. “We have ex¬ 
amined the city typewriters pretty thoroughly,** said Harri¬ 
son. “We pose as typewriter repairers and even if a machine 
doesn’t need fixing up we get a chance to look at it and in a 
quarter of a minute have its alignment and the data we need. 
To-morrow we’ll go out in the country north and especially 
in the vicinity of Cardon. We can cover a big territory in a 
day.” 

“Did you come across any stationery that looked anything 
like the letter paper or the envelope?” asked Delker. 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 279 

“Nothing at all like it. We covered the wholesale and re¬ 
tail trade but they have no such paper now in stock. If we 
do find it we won’t make any mistake in recognizing it.” 

The next forenoon about eleven o’clock Harrison and his 
aide drove up to the Clarion office. v Get your committee to¬ 
gether. I’ve solved the mystery,” he said. Bush called the 
seven who were present at the first meeting and they re¬ 
sponded at once. I’ll report of our work verbally,” said 
Harrison, “as I haven’t time to write it out. We went north 
early this morning and tested the machines as we went over a 
wide scope of country. We came to Albright and worked 
around there. We found out Big Jim Albright had a ma¬ 
chine but he was away campaigning and no one could tell us 
the make or the number. We were going to do thorough 
work, however, and I waited and caught Judge Albright as he 
came to do some chores and got into the house where the type¬ 
writer was. It was a number five Excelsior and the first line 
of letters I jiggled off showed me I had found the machine. 
The Judge had unlocked the desk and to fully test the ma¬ 
chine I pulled a sheet of paper from the desk. It wasn’t 
our paper. I tore it across, accidentally of course, and drew 
out another sheet from a separate compartment labeled 
‘Church Notices.’ It was our paper. I tested the machine 
thoroughly on it and then drew out an envelope from the same 
compartment to test the machine addressing envelopes. It 
was our envelope. I showed the Judge how dirty the ma¬ 
chine was and told him I might call later to clean it up 
when Big Jim was at home. I put my tested paper and 
envelope in my pocket and here they are with the date of 
the test and some identifying facts written on the machine 
itself.” 

The committee examined the samples closely. Bush laid 
them on the desk. The seven men looked at each other with¬ 
out a word. They were all thinking the same thoughts; 
why talk? At last Smith said emphatically: “Well, I 
wouldn’t have believed it; but it’s true.” 

“Yes, it’s true,” said Reyland. 


28 o 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

“True it is,” said Caledon. 

“And now what?” queried Smith. 

“What corroborative evidence have you?” broke in Delker. 

“The letters were mailed the day before yesterday at Car- 
don. He was there at the post office that forenoon and drop¬ 
ped some letters in the box,” said Smith. “And he is a rabid 
prohibitionist and the sentiment of the letters are like his. 
He has just those opinions,” said Caledon. “And he was an 
onlooker at the ball for a few minutes. He was in the kitchen 
for a short time while the dancing was going on and saw it. 
My wife happened into the kitchen along with some of the 
other ladies and saw him there talking with the chef. The 
chef will corroborate it as will half a dozen of the ladies,” said 
Reyland. 

“Has anyone had access to that typewriter besides Big 
Jim and his wife?”asked Delker. 

“No one,” said Harrison. “I asked Judge Albright the 
particular question: ‘Who used that machine?’ He was 
emphatic in saying that only Big Jim used it. Mrs. Albright 
can’t typewrite and no one else connected with the family can. 
Big Jim is the only typist there and the only one that has used 
that machine since he got it. While he has been away the 
house has been locked and no one gets in.” 

“Could there be any possibility of another machine making 
exactly the same peculiar variations from the standard?” 

“None whatever. The idea is so improbable that it is 
impossible. No other machine in all the world would have 
all these variations exactly the same as this one.” 

“It’s clearly a case for the county prosecutor,” said Delker 
slowly. “Clearly a case for him.” 

“It’s already beyond us, I see,” said Caledon. “My judg¬ 
ment is: Let the law take its course.” 

“Mine exactly,” said Smith. 

“And mine,” said Reyland. 

“Well, gentlemen, I advise this,” said Delker, “that we give 
out nothing except that the most important and convincing 
evidence has been discovered. Let us give no hint of who the 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 281 

culprit may be. That will be only treating the prosecutor and 
the accused fairly. Then we will be in the position of not 
pre-judging the case or showing bias or prejudice. ,, 

“That is exactly right,” said Bush. “I will only comment 
to the extent of stating just that fact in the newspapers and 
leave all names out.” 

“And Til do the same,” said Stribling. “We’ll have the 
case tried in the court and not in the newspapers.” 

“That’s the proper thing,” said Delker. “We all know Big 
Jim is in politics; that he’s a candidate now out before the 
public for an office. We must at all hazards avoid making 
this a partisan affair. It’s a dirty mess and we’ll let the 
guilty stew in his own grease but we’ll let the prosecutor and 
the court kindle the fire. We will keep out of it in a personal 
way.” 

“ I think you’re right,” said Reyland. 

“So do I,” said Smith. 

“And I,” said Caledon. 

“Now I’d suggest,” said Delker, “that you three gentlemen 
make up the committee that goes to the prosecutor and lays 
the case before him; also that we keep absolutely mum our¬ 
selves as to the person involved and as to the exact contents of 
this letter. And I have just one further suggestion, and that 
is, that we need that typewriter in our case as evidence. If 
it is left there you know what might happen to it. The 
county prosecutor can order the sheriff to take it but it should 
be done in the presence of witnesses and a test of it should be 
made right there when he takes it. Then it should be kept 
sealed up in the safe of the sheriff’s office or in some other safe 
until the time of trial so that the sheriff could give evidence as 
to its being in his possession all the time and that it is in the 
exact condition it was when it was taken from Big Jim’s 
house.” 

The conference closed and the committee took a copy of the 
letter and the other evidence and started to the court house to 
report to the prosecutor. As they went out Delker said to 
Bush: “Big Jim’s game is up. He has no more chance of 


282 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

being the sheriff of this county than I have of being president. 
When this is through he wouldn’t get a hundred votes alto¬ 
gether and he’ll go way back where he belongs.” 

“I don’t look on it just that optimistically,” said Bush. 
“It’s a good idea not to despise the strength or capabilities 
of the enemy; to treat him as a worthy opponent till he’s licked 
and really down and out for good. With everything against 
him and nothing in his favor I feel that Big Jim will still put 
up a stiff fight and that we have considerable of a job on our 
hands and the longer time he has the more difficult our job will 
be. And say, Delker, you’re next to the prosecutor; for 
heaven’s sake insist on him delaying the trial in this case till 
after election. Influence him to delay it and still delay it. 
He can do it easy enough; just dally along and keep it up 
in the air like a toy balloon that everybody can see till the 
election’s over. Then he can bring it to a trial as quickly 
as he pleases and the sooner the better. If we can keep it 
up in the air just about as it is now it will be a sure winner. 
And also impress on the prosecutor not to give Big Jim or his 
people a view of that letter or a copy of it till he’s compelled 
to. The longer it can be kept from the public and from the 
enemy the better it will be for us politically and otherwise. 
He can keep that till the very last minute and keep them guess¬ 
ing. It’s a trick of the trade and should be worked. We 
shouldn’t dissipate public imaginings as to what’s really in the 
letter till it’s peremptory so to do.” 

“I’ll get after him right away about that delay business and 
also about the letter for I agree with you,” said Delker. 
“Bob will do the right thing, I know. He’s a good fellow 
always when we need a good fellow.” 

The committee found the prosecutor in his office and care¬ 
fully laid all the evidence before him, both direct and corrob¬ 
orative. “I’m justified, in fact compelled, to go ahead with 
this case,” said the prosecutor as they finished. “It’s one 
of the completest circumstantial evidence cases I ever saw. 
I’ll go over the whole situation carefully again by myself, be¬ 
cause this is a case in which we should do everything very 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 283 

carefully and with all consideration. If I arrive at the same 
conclusions I’ll have a warrant issued to-morrow for the 
arrest of the accused. You have done good work, gentlemen, 
and I thank you for the aid you have given. I will now go 
ahead and do my part without fear or favor. Your wives 
and families and the good reputation of the society in which 
they move are going to be vindicated thoroughly after this 
treacherous assailment.” 

“Now,” said Caledon as they left the office, “we’ll only tell 
the public the one thing: That an arrest is to be made and 
leave them in the dark as to who is to be arrested.” 

As the committee withdrew Delker came in. “Say, Bob,” 
he said in a low, confidential tone as the two were seated, 
“you and I have always been good friends, haven’t we?” 

“That we have, Lew, and I hope the friendship will always 
continue. It has been one of the pleasures of my life to have 
you for a friend.” 

“And I’ve always played square with you at all times.” 

“Perfectly square at all times. No man could play 
squarer.” 

“Well, then, I want to ask a special favor, one that’s easy 
in your power to grant and which won’t put you out in the 
least.” 

“Consider the favor already granted, Lew. I’ll be only 
too glad to oblige you even if it does put me out some. I 
owe you some obligations, anyway. There’s a mortgage al¬ 
ready lifted, a house built and a bank account that speaks 
loud words in your favor. What is it you wish me to do?” 

“Well, you know the election is coming on and this case of 
Big Jim’s will be coming up also. Now if the case can be kept 
hanging fire till after the election, even twenty-four hours 
after, it would fit in with all our plans. This Big Jim Albright 
is the one thorn in our side. If he were eliminated all the rest 
of the fight would be easy. Our people abroad are demand¬ 
ing that he be beaten either in the primary or the general 
election afterward. If he does not win a place in the primary 
election he can’t be a candidate in the real election. Now if 


284 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

this case is kept hanging over his head till after the primary is 
over he doesn’t stand any chance whatever; he’s not even a 
ten thousand-to-one bet; he can’t possibly get anywhere; he’s 
out for good and I’m satisfied would withdraw. Now I sup¬ 
pose it’s up to you to press the case to a speedy conclusion or 
to go slow and allow it to take its regular course; which might 
mean all the delays that are regular and some that are ir¬ 
regular if necessary. It’s only a short time, anyway, to the 
primary and a little conservative slowness would turn the 
trick and do it without any suspicion in any quarter. You 
have to gather evidence and to sift it and besides you have 
lots of other work in your office. As for the mortgage and 
the home and the bank account they are all right and there 
are other and even brighter days coming.” 

“I certainly have more work on hand than can be done by 
our force and since you spoke I see now quite clearly that I 
can’t shelve any of the work that is already piled up here for 
this new case. It will have to take its turn and if there’s 
delay, which there will be, a good deal of it, we are not to 
blame. I’m satisfied we can’t get this case up at this term 
of court and if it doesn’t it can’t be heard till the next term, 
three months later. I’m sure now since you brought it up 
that it will have to go over to the term after this one. In 
fact, I know it will. There’s one factor, however, to be con¬ 
sidered. The judge can take a hand any time in any court 
matter. What he might do or might not do I couldn’t say. 
Big Jim will have able lawyers and they will naturally press 
for a speedy trial and the court could peremptorily order the 
case to be set for trial any time. However, the present out¬ 
look is that the case will go over to the next term.” 

“All right, then; and now as to this letter itself, the basis of 
the case, we have carefully kept it from the public. No one 
has seen the letter itself except a select few who are not talking 
much and we want it kept from the public just as long as 
possible.” 

“I can do that, too, and I’ll tell you confidentially, Lew, 
that if I follow my present plans I’ll make a complaint in the 



BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 285 

Justice court. This is not a Justice court case. The guilt 
of this party must be tried in the superior court before a jury 
but I can file a complaint in the Justice court and have the 
accused arrested and put under bond for a preliminary hear¬ 
ing in the Justice court. When he appears with his attorneys 
after being arrested the Justice will set a date for trial in his 
court. I can keep quiet till that date comes and then can do 
one of two things. I can either go ahead and have a pre¬ 
liminary hearing in the Justice court and have him put under 
bond to appear in the superior court for the real trial or I can, 
just before the hearing in the Justice court, dismiss the case 
there and at the same moment have an information, as we 
call it, or a complaint filed in the superior court. If this 
latter course is followed the accused would be freed completely 
in the Justice court but would immediately be arrested by the 
sheriff and put under bond to appear in the superior court for 
trial. If I begin the case in the lower court I think it means 
more time for me to do my other work as this case would 
necessarily be delayed more or less in going through two 
courts. We can decide these matters of procedure when the 
time comes with an eye to getting results for ourselves. We 
are the parties who have the deciding in our hands. Mean¬ 
time, there’s no cause for us to worry or to get excited or 
unduly hasten anything. Let the other fellow do the worry¬ 
ing is my motto.” 

“And what if he happened to be cleared in the Justice 
court?” 

“The Justice can’t clear him. He can only decide at the 
very most that there is not evidence enough before the court 
to warrant putting him under bond to appear for trial in the 
superior court. If there’s any substantial evidence against 
the accused the Justice is compelled to bind him over for trial. 
The Justice doesn’t decide anything as to the guilt of the 
arrested party in these cases. If the Justice turned this 
prisoner loose I would immediately file my information in the 
superior court and bring him up for trial there just as if there 
had been no proceedings in the Justice jurisdiction.” 


286 


BIG'JIM ALBRIGHT 

“All right, two courts make two legal delays and two legal 
delays are what we want exactly. ,, 

“As to the letter; at some point in the game it will have to 
be made public. I can keep it till that time and will do so. 
They will have good lawyers and will force our hand but till 
they force us to do so I will keep the letter safely locked up 
here in our safe. It’s a pretty strong letter but not as strong 
as the public imagination. We’ll do the best we can to get 
a clear vindication for the women of the city and if you 
win your election at the same time and elect all your 
ticket on the liberal program, why, that’s part of the game. 
You profit by having justice done; that’s all. It looks like 
as if the cards had been stacked for the other fellow’s deal 
and he was forced to deal out high, low, jack, and the game 
to you.” 

“It does look that way. Well, so long; and I’m going to 
put a special postscript to a letter I’m going to write to-night 
to headquarters and I can assure you that they know and 
appreciate their friends and any favor their friends do for 
them. There’s one thing our folks never do: They never 
forget a friend who stands by them when they need a friend 
and they’re going to be very generous in this campaign. The 
fellow who stands like a rock for liberalism is going to get his 
reward.” 

“And liberalism is common sense just now. So long, Lew. 
I’ll speak to the Justice and have this case set for trial as far 
ahead as possible.” 

The next morning Delker’s ’phone rang early. “This is 
the Justice of the Peace,” the voice said. “Can you drop 
into my office pretty soon?” 

“Right away,” said Delker. Without waiting for his 
breakfast he started for the Justice’s office. 

“I’ve got a warrant made out for Big Jim Albright. I 
didn’t like to mention it over the ’phone. I want to find out 
where he is so the constable can locate him without runhing 
all over creation.” 

“He’s out in the southeast corner of the district. He’s to 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 287 

be present at a farmers’ meeting there at the Dexter school 
this afternoon and is to make a speech at three o’clock.” 

“Good enough! The constable can reach there by that 
time easily and get back to-night.” 

“Who’s going to make the arrest?” 

“Milo Grable. He’s the only constable who is free to-day.” 

“It’ll be considerable pleasure for Milo, won’t it?” 

“Yes; Milo is anti-prohibition enough to enjoy arresting a 
prohib. I bet he doesn’t make any secret of the arrest when 
he makes it. If Big Jim is on the platform he’s liable to take 
him right off. Here’s Milo in his new Ford auto.” 

“Hello, Milo! I see you have work laid out for you this 
morning,” said Delker. 

“Yes; where is that fellow?” said Milo gruffly. “I’ve got 
my handcuffs with me and I’ll use them if there’s any chance, 
see if I don’t. Them prohibs is bad medicine. Even they’ll 
scandalize the very decentest women folks behind their 
backs.” 

“He’s out at the Dexter schoolhouse; will be there at three 
o’clock to-day. He’s to make a speech there. Here’s your 
warrant; be sure you bring him in.” 

“I’ll bring him in all right. He’ll make no speech at the 
Dexter schoolhouse this afternoon. This warrant doesn’t 
authorize any prohibition speeches there this afternoon.” 

The Big Jim Albright campaign was reaching a great height 
of enthusiasm in the district while these happenings were 
taking place in the city. Reverend Story and a band of 
faithful church workers had quietly organized “The Persuad¬ 
er’s Club” for the purpose of persuading voters into voting 
for Big Jim and persuading them out of any opposition they 
might want to put up. It had been a most effective little 
organization. It was intensely practical and the machinery 
of it worked without any noise. The members of it had seen 
the multitude of candidates scattered over the district advo¬ 
cating the same principles as Jim and although they had no 
evidence suspected some trickery. 


288 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

Their first organized effort was to get out quietly among 
the church members and law upholders of the different com¬ 
munities and bring persuasions to bear to have these extra 
prohibition candidates withdraw and leave the field to Big 
Jim. They were remarkably successful in this as Jim clearly 
had a considerable following and none of the others had when 
the situation was analyzed. So many withdrew that it left a 
pretty clear field for Jim. Then the club began an intensive, 
personal appeal campaign for him and in this also they were 
remarkably successful so that his way was made much easier. 
Meanwhile he and Mary were campaigning on their own ac¬ 
count in their own way and found it easier as time passed 
owing partly to the club’s efficient work. 

On the afternoon of the day Grable started out Jim had 
arranged to speak at a community farmers’ meeting. It was 
in a country schoolhouse and the people out there were with 
him. They were anti-whiskey country people and promised 
him strong support. The meeting had commenced and Jim 
was called on by the chairman. He had just got fairly 
started when Grable burst in at the door. The schoolhouse 
was packed, even the aisles being filled, with the well-to-do, 
well-dressed, and courteously behaved country residents, 
prosperous farmers and their wives and families, and as Grable 
threw wide open the door and strode in with his hat on and a 
pair of jingling, shiny steel handcuffs in his hand, the audi¬ 
ence all turned and looked at this strange intruder. Grable 
had the star of a constable pinned on his coat. He had been 
drinking hard on the journey out and he showed the effects. 

His eyes had the glazed look and his face the burning red 
look and his walk the swagger look of the drunken man who 
still could walk but was viciously drunk. Jim stopped his 
address as this stranger swayed and semi-lurched up the aisle, 
shoving those in the aisle seats out of his way and creating a 
great commotion. The chairman, a brawny, gray-haired 
farmer, rose with anger on his face at this boorish interruption 
and several other athletic countrymen started for the front 
at the same time. 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 289 

Grable pushed his way through before he could be stopped 
and came directly up in front of Jim. ‘Til just put these on 
you,” he said in a hoarse tone and grasped Jim’s hand. Jim 
quietly wrenched his hand loose and looked in amazement at 
the squat figure before him. The chairman had just reached 
out his own big hand to grasp Grable’s collar when he blurted 
out: “Got a warrant for you; got it right here,” and he put 
his hand in his coat pocket and pulled out first an almost 
empty whiskey bottle and then a dirty paper which he handed 
Jim, at the same time nodding toward him vigorously and 
exclaiming in the same hoarse tone, “Got a warrant, all right, 
it’s a warrant all right,” which he kept repeating over and 
over again like a parrot. 

The chairman and the other farmers seeing that the fellow 
really did have something authoritative with him desisted 
from throwing him out as they had intended and waited for 
Jim who opened the dirty paper and read out loud a warrant 
for his arrest on a charge of criminal libel signed by a Justice 
of the Peace. “It looks regular,” said Jim, handing it to 
the chairman who read it slowly and scutinized it very care¬ 
fully. 

“It is regular,” he said. “I was Justice of the Peace at 
home and this is a real warrant. Whether it’s a joke or not 
is the question. It looks like a joke to me.” He handed 
the warrant to the other farmers who had crowded around 
and they all read it interestedly as the audience rose to its 
feet and exchanged short comments and exclamations of sur¬ 
prise. 

“It’s regular enough,” said Grable in a more conciliatory 
tone as a gleam of common sense seemed to light up his brain 
fog and he began to realize he was not exactly the master of 
the situation he had primed himself with the moonshine 
whiskey to be. He had been glorying in the fact that he was 
the law and that he would storm the citadel of the country 
schoolhouse, batter down the gates, and take Big Jim away in 
triumph, handcuffed to his auto for the public to gaze on as 
the Roman public used to gaze on the slaves chained to Nero’s 


2 9 o BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

chariot wheels. Surrounded by these big, sober, respectable¬ 
looking, and also determined-looking farmers and with Big 
Jim towering over him there came to him the glimmering of 
an idea that he’d better try to be more of a gentleman and less 
of a bully. 

“I’ll tell you what we’ll do,” said Chairman Montague de¬ 
cidedly in a tone that penetrated even Grable’s understanding 
and laid down the law of the moment even to him, drink 
soaked as he was; “we’ll let Mr. Snowden here go out and 
’phone to our grange store to have the manager call up the 
county attorney and learn all about this warrant. If it’s a 
real warrant he knows all about it. He originated the action 
if there is one. If he doesn’t know of it then it’s a joke and 
this fellow’s a practical joker or the goat of some practical 
jokers. In the meantime, we’ll go ahead with our meeting 
and listen to Mr. Albright. Mr. Snowden, will you get the 
information and do not make any report till Mr. Albright gets 
through speaking. That will probably be in an hour from 
now. As for you, my constable friend, you will go back in 
that far corner behind the stove where you can’t be seen and 
sit there till you’re wanted. I’ll give you in charge of Jack 
McKeever and you’ll obey his orders. If you make any noise 
or interrupt this meeting he’ll throw you out and lock you 
up in the stable. If a real action has been brought against 
Mr. Albright he will go with you or rather you will go with 
him after this meeting is over and not before. Now, Mc¬ 
Keever, you take charge of our friend here and I ask the 
audience to settle down and listen to Mr. Albright and forget 
there’s been any interruptions.” 

“All right, come along,” said the strong-armed young fellow 
named McKeever, as he rather enjoyably to himself took 
Grable by the back of the neck and fairly lifted him over the 
seats and landed him slumped up in a corner near the door 
out of sight of the audience where he soon went to sleep in the 
warm atmosphere. 

Big Jim resumed his speech as the audience settled down in 
response to the chairman’s request. 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 291 

“It’s a real case,” reported Mr. Snowden. “The warrant 
is authorized and this drunken fellow here is the constable of 
the court.” 

“Then our meeting is adjourned for the day,” said the 
chairman and the audience crowded around Jim and Mary. 

“I don’t know any more about it than anyone in this 
room,” said Jim. “It is undoubtedly a put-up job of some 
kind but we won’t know what it is till we get into the city. 
We’ll go right away.” 

“And we’ll go with you,” said the chairman. “It may be 
a bond will be needed and if it is we’ll be right there. There’s 
some sort of a game afoot. We’ll take a wad of money along 
with us so as to be ready if they want a cash bond. There’s 
a lot of fellows want to get you out of the campaign, Albright, 
and they’ve put up some trick to achieve this. We’ll have 
two auto loads of us fellows go with you and we’ll be ready in 
ten minutes. You and Mrs. Albright will ride with me in my 
auto. McKeever or someone will ride with this jail-bird 
constable and drive his auto for I’d be afraid to trust him to 
drive it in the condition he’s in.” 

“I’ll deliver him at the city hall,” said McKeever. “Come 
on, my pretty bird,” he continued, grabbing Milo by the 
collar again and taking him out to the auto on the run al¬ 
though the constable wasn’t yet awake. “There, get in and 
sit down and act as if you owned the earth along with this 
auto. It isn’t often you have a chauffeur like me to drive 
you around,” saying which he grasped Milo by the arm and 
leg and heaved him into the rear seat. He started out before 
the others and was well on his way before they got everything 
arranged for the two auto loads that followed. Milo had 
been rudely jolted and as the whiskey effect had been slept off 
to a certain extent he awakened wide awake for a man as 
drunk as he was. He tried to talk to McKeever but the rat¬ 
tle of the car which was traveling furiously drowned his voice 
and irritated him. He began to feel and act quarrelsome with 
his companion but that impervious, broad-shouldered in¬ 
dividual paid no attention to him except to keep an eye on 


292 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

him to see that he didn’t jump out of the auto or do some other 
drunken man’s trick. 

When he couldn’t quarrel with McKeever he became irri¬ 
tated with himself apparently and began to berate himself 
and the world generally for being a fool and coming out here. 
After talking to himself for some time a happy thought 
struck him; his bottle. He fumbled around his pockets and 
found, not only the one that was almost empty through his 
persistence in patronizing it coming out, but another full 
flask that he had hid away in an inside pocket. He stopped 
his maundering talk and a look of beatific contentment re¬ 
placed the expression of grieved despair on his sodden face. 

He carefully sampled the nearly emptied bottle and drained 
it and then laboriously uncorked the full flask and sampled it. 
As they flew along the road he kept on sampling it till he be¬ 
gan to wobble around in his seat. As he had the seat to him¬ 
self McKeever let him wobble. Presently he lurched over 
and lay full length along the seat. The bottle fell to the floor 
of the auto and the neck broke off. McKeever got to the 
city hall just as darkness came on. Everybody, even the 
janitor, had gone home to supper. He looked at Milo. Milo 
slept the deep, snoring, forgetful sleep of the living dead. He 
was dead to this world. There was no help to be got from 
him. McKeever drove around to the rear of the building 
and got out. He shook Milo. The only response was the 
jingle of the handcuffs Milo had tried to fasten on Jim’s wrists. 
They fell out of his pocket. McKeever picked them up and 
looked at them curiously in the electric light that shone 
through the windows. They were the first handcuffs he had 
ever seen and he was twenty-four years old. Milo’s hand 
lay extended across the robe rail on the back of the front seat. 
To try how they worked the farmer boy put one cuff on Milo’s 
wrist. He pressed a little too hard and it snapped locked. 
He tried to take it off but it wouldn’t come off. Then he saw 
the key-hole and reasoned that Milo had a key to the cuffs 
somewhere. He hesitated a minute and then with a grin put 
the other cuff around the robe rail and snapped it locked. 


293 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

“Nobody will steal him from his auto or his auto from him 
this night,” he said as he walked out of the yard and went to a 
restaurant for supper. 

Milo had a restful slumber. A few times during the night 
he tried to turn over but gave it up. The handcuffs forbade 
any turning over. At dawn he was found by a watchman who 
first imagined that he had run across a murder right in the 
shadow of the police station and then knew he had found a 
comic moving picture when he got a good look at Milo, his 
two bottles, and the handcuffs. The watchman stood and 
laughed awhile, then straightened his face and then laughed 
some more. He started round the hall to alarm the police 
patrol and bring him on the run but thought the joke might 
cause Milo to lose his job so he came back and shook him 
violently. Milo’s sleep had been a good one and a reasonably 
long one and he awoke some and then awoke some more and 
kept on awaking till he was wide awake. He stared stupidly 
while he was coming to his senses at the hand which was fast 
to the robe rail. 

“Were you afraid of somebody stealing either yourself or 
your auto?” queried the watchman. 

“I’ll get you for this,” growled Milo hoarsely as he tried 
vainly to pull his hand out of the cuff. “Unlock that cuff,” 
he roared. 

“How can I unlock it? You’ve got the key,” said the 
watchman. 

“No, I haven’t; you’ve got it and I’ll get you for this.” 

“Search your pockets,” said the watchman. “You’ve 

got it.” 

Milo began a search that ended in his finding his bunch of 
keys and he unlocked himself. He started his auto and 
turned around without a word. The occasion was too serious 
for mere words. The watchman saw him drive away. 
“Well, a fellow sees lots of theatre goods off the stage if he 
only looks for them,” he chuckled as he went on his rounds. 

Milo drove halfway home trying all the time to clear his 
brain so it would think for him. He found that a brain that 


294 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

wouldn’t think when he wanted it to think as badly as he 
wanted it to think just now and wouldn’t think even when he 
persuaded it and urged it and commanded it to think was a 
most unstable and useless servant. He smelled the whiskey 
and looked back over the front seat to where one bottle lay 
empty and another smashed and the rug soaked with the 
liquor. He never wanted a drink so bad in his life, but the 
problem of how he came to be out in that city-hall yard and 
why all these strange doings and surroundings bore down heav¬ 
ily on him. Where had he been? 

He stopped his auto on the side of the street and thought 
and thought. It was now early morning or early evening. 
There was the sun either coming up or going down. It was 
early morning. Where was he last night? Where was he 
yesterday? It slowly came back to him. He had started 
out in the forenoon with a warrant for Big Jim Albright. 
Yes, there were the two bottles he had bought as primers for 
the job; as courage and fierceness arousers. He remembered 
he was going to eat Big Jim up if Big Jim didn’t cower down 
and tremble and beg. Yes, he had driven out there and he 
remembered going up to the platform to arrest Big Jim and 
after that was a blank. He had a warrant. Where was 
that? He searched all his pockets; no warrant. He must 
make a return of Big Jim’s arrest on that warrant; and had 
he arrested Big Jim? They had hoodooed him. 

Big Jim had escaped and probably had the warrant. He 
would be disgraced for ever; he, the champion constable of 
constables to let a prisoner escape; especially such a promi¬ 
nent prisoner. Never before had he been sent to arrest so 
prominent a criminal. He wouldn’t let that be said. There 
was yet time. He would drive back there and bring Big Jim 
in, shackled. 

He turned the street corner with a flourish and sailed across 
the streets and out into the country breaking all speed laws. 
The country folks along his route thought a madman had 
broken loose as he flashed by bound for the Dexter school- 
house. The nearest resident to the school was just opening 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 295 

his front gate in the morning when Milo, red faced and flus¬ 
tered, thundered up. “Can you tell me where Big Jim 
Albright is?” he asked nervously. 

“Gone to town last night. You’ll find him there at the 
city hall, I suppose. Oh, it’s you, is it? Why, I thought you 
went in with the others. Did you lose Big Jim or did he lose 
you?” The farmer was grinning and at the same time won¬ 
dering how this fellow happened to come out there again and 
why he looked so much like a wild man. 

Without answering Milo swung around cursing. He saw it 
all now. Big Jim had gone in and would give himself up and 
there would be no arrest; and what if Big Jim also had thewar- 
rant and flashed it on the court? A criminal arresting him¬ 
self and then reporting himself with a warrant. A cold sweat 
came out on his hot brow. The jig was up. He was dis¬ 
graced. He would slow up and think. No, that wouldn’t 
do. He must get back to the city hall as quickly as he could 
and face it out some way but his warmed-up brain, which was 
now working overtime, spurred on by his fears, made his 
journey hideous with pictures of what might happen. 

He drove up to the police station side of the city hall. Bet¬ 
ter prospect round a little first and find out how the land lay. 
“What has happened in the Big Jim case?” he inquired with 
fear in his heart as one of the policemen came out. 

“Case set for a week from to-day,” said the policeman who 
was rushing along with mind intent on other things. 

Milo went into the Justice’s office. “How’s everything 
going?” he stammered to the Justice who was there alone 
and who didn’t even look up from his work. 

“All right,” said the Justice. “There’s the warrant. 
Make your return on it dated yesterday. You were justified 
in allowing the prisoner to go to the hotel for the night but you 
should have kept the warrant yourself.” Milo’s heart 
bounded. The Justice hadn’t even looked at him. He 
turned his back to him and scrawled the return on the back of 
the warrant and slipped out, the happiest man in the city. 

The chief of police was standing in his doorway. “Well, 


296 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

Milo, which of you had the honor of arresting Big Jim Al¬ 
bright and bringing him in?” he asked. 

“I was the officer that had that pleasure,” said Milo in a 
swaggering way. “Had quite a time doing it, too. Had to 
partly handcuff him and I drew my gun and stood off a whole 
bunch of farmers who were going to rescue him after I had 
him arrested. If I hadn’t had the right kind of nerve and 
knew just what to do they’d have taken him away from me 
after I had him a prisoner.” 

He swaggered on down the street. That persuasive morn¬ 
ing thirst had come back on him. His brain was working 
furiously now and doing some of its usual stunts in realistic 
imaginings. The blood throbbed through it and there was 
wafted to him in fancy the entrancing odor of whiskey; 
another throb and in more realistic fancy he could hear the 
gurgling melody of an upraised pint flask of moonshine and 
the taste was nectar. He disappeared in the rear door of a 
pool hall and in ten minutes was babbling drunkenly to a 
group of bums of how he had, gun in hand, single handed, 
fought a houseful of hayseeds and dragged Big Jim Albright 
out as a prisoner from their midst. 


CHAPTER XVIII 


I T WAS dark when the two auto loads of farmers with Jim 
and Mary arrived at the city hall; some time after Mc- 
Keever had locked Milo to the auto and gone to supper. 
“Everyone has gone home for the night,” said Montague. 
“Fll tell you what we’ll do: we’ll go to the hotel and put up 
for the night and see a lawyer and report to the Justice in the 
morning. That will be better than trying to straighten out 
this tangle to-night.” 

They drove around to a hotel frequented by the farmer’s 
organizations and unloaded and registered. 

“Hello, what’s this?” said Montague as his glance caught 
the front page of the Evening Clarion lying on the counter. 
It was a big, red, sensational display newshead running clear 
across the front page. The letters were an inch long: “Big 
Jim Albright arrested as criminal.” The next line was 
nearly as large type: “Charged with criminally libeling noted 
women.” Then followed a smaller type, though a large 
flash head: “Letters written to newspapers assail the conduct 
and character of the most respectable wives and mothers of 
the city. The writer names several of these ladies. He 
signs fake signature. The authorities sure they have com¬ 
plete proof. Leading citizens express detestation of the de- 
famer’s act. Society aflame demands punishment.” 

“I’ll take half a dozen of these,” Montague said to the 
clerk as he threw down the necessary silver to pay for the 
papers. “Folks, we’ll go up to my room and read this,” and 
he led the way to the elevator. 

“So, we’ve got Big Jim right here,” said the clerk excitedly 
as he looked at the signatures. “Gee, I wonder who has him 
in custody. I’ll bet it’s that other big fellow.” In a few 

297 


298 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

minutes the lobby of the hotel was filled with questioners and 
the clerk was the centre of news interest, a most important 
personage. 

“Oh, yes; he’s here all right; he’s in care of some officer; 
looks pretty worried, as if he knew something was going to 
drop; shows guilt; I’ll bet he confesses everything before 
twenty-four hours; sure it’ll be a long jail sentence; may go 
to the pen.” 

These and other rapid-fire observations were kept up 
among the crowd who passed the news around by ’phone and 
otherwise to their friends so that in half an hour everyone 
connected with the case in any way knew where Big Jim was, 
how he looked, felt, acted, talked, and thought. The gossip- 
ers had a mental picture of him as a trembling criminal at 
the bar of retributive justice. 

The party sat down in the parlor upstairs and Montague 
divided the papers. They read the article with amazement 
and rising anger. The news covered a considerable part of 
the front page and was an arraignment of Big Jim of the most 
finished newspaper artistry. It had direct statement and in¬ 
direct statement that sounded like direct statement, and 
innuendo, that sounded like fact, and suggestion that sounded 
like absolute proof. Every sentence helped to make every 
paragraph reiterate over and over again in various forms that 
Big Jim was a dastard as well as a criminal and that he had 
been caught and the proofs were wound around him so that 
he couldn’t extricate himself. Then followed short interviews 
with leading citizens in the city who were concerned in the 
case; with men and women; the interviews embracing de¬ 
nunciation, sarcasm, and righteous appeals to justice winding 
up with a talk with the county attorney in which he said that 
he was astonished beyond measure when the matter was first 
brought to his attention but that as the investigation pro¬ 
ceeded proofs piled up so thickly and so clearly pointed out 
the accused that he was forced under the oath of his office to 
begin legal proceedings. “One thing is certain,” he continued: 
“a great wrong has been done or attempted to be done to the 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 299 

wives and mothers of many of the citizens of this city and we 
will invoke and bring into play every resource of the law to 
protect the sacredness of the home and the reputation of our 
home makers.” 

All the party read the article from beginning to end. Jim 
finished first and then Mary finished reading her copy. She 
clasped his big hand and they both waited silently till the 
others had read it all. Montague laid his paper on the table 
and leaned back in his chair. 

“It’s a dirty, terribly dirty attack, Jim. It’s organized 
whiskey stabbing in the dark.” 

“ I see,” said Jim calmly, “just what it is and what it means. 
I’m the man they’re afraid of and I must be killed off. There’s 
not the least basis for it. I’ve written no letters nor made any 
verbal attacks on any man or woman. I’ll meet them and I’ll 
beat them. Whiskey can’t do this thing and get away with 
it.” 

At this juncture there was a knock on the door and Rev¬ 
erend Story and his political club came in. They had been 
in the city, had just got their first intimation of the case from 
the newspaper, and had found out where Jim was. The 
heartfelt hand clasp of these friends told Jim more than words 
could. 

“We’ve just come in,” he said to the group, “and we got 
our first news of what was on foot from the Clarion five 
minutes ago. I was just saying to my friends here that I’ve 
written no letters of any kind nor made any verbal attacks 
on any one. There’s no basis in truth for this attack and 
I’m going to meet it fairly and squarely and beat it.” 

“Do you recall any letters written before this campaign or 
anything either before or since it started that could be twisted 
into such an attack; anything at all of any kind?” asked 
Montague, who had been impressed by the article more 
than he liked to admit. 

“Nothing of any kind or character, either to my friends 
or opponents or the newspapers or anyone on earth. I wrote 
no letters or any kind of writing at any time that could be 


300 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

twisted into this attack. Evidently they have something 
in the shape of letters but I didn’t write them or dictate them 
or know of their existence.” 

“I know that Jim has neither written nor said anything 
that this charge could be based on for I know everything 
he has written since the campaign commenced,” said Mary. 
“I didn’t think politics could get as low as this.” 

“It isn’t politics, it’s whiskey,” said Montague, “and 
whiskey knows no limit. I’m glad to hear you say, Jim, that 
there’s nothing you wrote that this case can be based on. I 
know what you’re up against and I’m with you to the end. 
Here’s my hand on it. You’re an innocent man and I’m 
by your side to the finish. Stay with them, boy.” The big 
farmer had grasped Jim’s hand as he spoke thus earnestly and 
as the two men shook hands in a pact of friendship the others 
gathered round and each one gave the same hearty pledge. 

“This makes both myself and Mary feel a thousand times 
better,” said Jim in a voice that showed a sign of emotion. 
Then straightening up he continued, “We have done nothing 
of the kind we are charged with in any shape, manner, or form 
and I’m going to fight it. I will call up Judge Runyon and 
put my case in his hands. I don’t know what forces are 
arrayed against me yet but I can see they’re powerful. I can 
beat them. I’ve got truth and justice and God on my side 
and I’ve more faith in Him to-night than I ever had. I wish 
all you folks who are here would go with me to the lawyer’s 
office. We’ll go there as soon as I can get him down.” 

While Jim was telephoning a rap at the door brought the 
response that the representatives of the morning papers 
wished to see him. Half-a-dozen reporters were ushered in 
and for half an hour Jim answered all the queries asked about 
himself and his campaign and the charges made against him. 
His presence at the hotel as a person nominally under arrest 
but really free was explained by going over the events of the 
afternoon, leaving out the account of Grable’s extraordinary 
conduct. When the newspaper men had taken photos and 
left, Jim and his friemds started for the lawyer’s office. 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 301 

They found the hotel lobby, which had been practically 
empty when they arrived, overflowing with people. It was 
with difficulty they made their way through the throng who 
were anxious to get a view of the now notorious character. 
It was not a friendly crowd and various unkind remarks 
reached their ears. Once Montague turned in anger to re¬ 
sent a slur aimed at Jim but thought better of it and walked 
on. ‘ What’s the use?” he said. “This is not a personal 
quarrel in any sense and if I knocked him down it wouldn’t 
settle anything.” 

They went over the case with the attorney although every¬ 
one was at sea as no one had any idea what the real evidence 
was. The newspapers only gave generalities. “We’ll go to 
the Justice court at nine in the morning with you and find 
out what we can about the evidence against you and then 
we can tell more about what should be done,” said the lawyer. 
“At the present time we have nothing to act on. We will 
have a stenographer run off a bond and have that ready. I 
suppose you have some two owners of real estate who can 
qualify on a bond. We don’t know what the bond will be 
fixed at.” 

“We will go on Jim’s bond up to fifty thousand dollars,” said 
Montague, “and if more’s necessary we’ll have more people 
come in.” 

“That’ll be enough and to spare. Come to the city hall at 
nine o’clock. We’ll be there with all necessary papers,” 
said the attorney. 

The party went back to the hotel and took possession of one 
of the upper parlors. The matter was settled for the night. 
Nothing more could be done. Delegations of Jim’s neigh¬ 
bors dropped in to see what it was all about in twos and threes 
and went away as mystified as they came. When the clock 
struck the hour of eleven they were reminded by Montague 
that this was a late hour for farmers to be up. 

“Let us all join in a hymn of praise to the Lord to-night,” 
said Jim, “and I request Reverend Story to lead us in prayer 
before we retire. We can trust God no matter what men do. 


302 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

I feel more than ever I did that ‘The Lord is my Refuge,’ ” 
and he repeated the psalm of trust that David sang in Israel’s 
troublous days. Then he led in singing and the circumstances 
added additional fervor to the supreme song of faith: 

“Other refuge have I none; 

Hangs my helpless soul on Thee; 

Leave, Oh, leave me not alone, 

Still support and comfort me.” 

The farmers were church members at home and were good 
singers with big, earnest voices and the impromptu sacred 
concert poured down the stairways and through the windows 
to the streets below arresting the attention of everyone in 
the vicinity. 

“What is it?” inquired a group who had passed and came 
back into the hotel lobby. 

“Big Jim is holding a prayer meeting upstairs,” laughed 
the clerk. 

“He’ll need more than prayers to save him, I’m thinking,” 
sneered a youth who stood with a cigarett dangling between 
his lips. 

“That he will,” agreed another youth of the same age. 
“It sounds to me like a Christian defiance to his accusers and 
a trumpet call to arms. I don’t believe the man who leads 
in singing that hymn ever wrote any slandering letters about 
women. I don’t know him but I’ve read to-night’s news¬ 
papers that indict him and I hear his answer up there ‘All 
my hope on Thee is stayed’ and my experience has been that 
it’s hard to beat a man who has that kind of faith when the 
skies are the blackest.” The speaker was Ben Holliday, a 
traveling salesman whom they all respected. The last stanza 
of the hymn echoed and died away and the voice of Reverend 
Story could be heard clear and distinct as he led the kneeling 
group in the parlor in prayer. 

“And now,” said Jim as they arose, “we’ll meet in the 
morning. I’m going to sleep as peacefully to-night as I ever 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 303 

did in my life. I’m going to trust in God and fight this fright¬ 
fully untruthful accusation as a man with a clear conscience 
can fight. Good-night, everybody!” 

At nine the next morning the office of the Justice was a busy 
place. The regular day’s rush was on, litigants and attor¬ 
neys with cases on the docket and on top of that Jim’s case 
was to be set. There was a crush of people not only in the 
office but around the building. It looked like a gathering 
for some advertised municipal event. Delker and Bush and 
several more of their crowd were standing outside. 

“Did the papers all go out?” asked Delker. 

“Every one,” answered Bush. “We got a copy of last 
night’s paper into every home in the city and the country 
districts.” 

“That’s all that’s necessary,” said Delker. “His race is 
ended. A Philistine will be sheriff and prayers to Baal will 
be said in that office during the next administration.” 

Jim and his attorney and party arrived on time and way 
was made for them to enter the office. “Good morning, Mr. 
Justice,” said the attorney. “I represent Mr. Albright who 
makes an appearance here under this warrant which your 
constable served. When you get ready for our case we are 
on hand.” 

“I’m ready now,” said the Justice. “The charge, I see, is 
criminal libel. We will fix the appearance bond at one 
thousand dollars and set the case for nine a.m. two weeks from 
to-day. Are you prepared to give bond?” 

“We are,” said the lawyer, “but just a moment, please; we 
ask that the case be taken up at an earlier date,” and he 
gave reasons in detail why so much delay would be a hardship 
on the defendant. 

“I have my docket crowded with cases,” said the Justice, 
“but I’ll consult with the prosecutor with regard to the time 
of trial. I understand his work is crowding him but I’ll call 
him and see what can be done.” 

The prosecutor appeared and Jim's lawyer again went over 


3 o 4 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

his argument for an earlier hearing. “ I don’t see how we can 
reach this case any earlier,” said the prosecutor. “Both the 
Judge here and myself have our hands more than full in the 
near future and we have to complete gathering the evidence 
in this case. We need time, even more time than the two 
weeks, but I’m willing to be on hand at that date and go to 
trial.” Jim’s lawyer made another plea for an earlier date 
but the prosecutor was firm. 

“If it is settled that there must be a delay of two weeks be¬ 
fore the preliminary hearing you will give us a copy of the 
letters that the defendant is charged with writing and the 
names of such witnesses as you may be going to call.” 

“I couldn’t promise anything in that line just now. I am 
investigating and going over the evidence and have no list of 
witnesses made up.” 

“But the defendant is entitled to this; it is his right,” per¬ 
sisted the lawyer. “In the superior court it is obligatory 
and the practice here follows that of the superior court.” 

“The best I can do at the present time is to say that all the 
evidence I have will be available at the preliminary trial,” 
said the prosecutor. Jim’s attorney made a final plea for a 
copy of the letters at least but got no definite promise. 

“Bob is standing pat,” whispered Delker to Bush as they 
stood outside the open window and listened. “They will 
get neither an earlier trial nor any of the evidence.” 

The attorneys fixed up the bond. It was accepted and they 
all left the building. “We could do practically nothing to¬ 
ward forcing the hand of the prosecutor in this preliminary 
hearing,” explained the lawyer. “If it were in the superior 
court we could take more definite action but a preliminary 
hearing in the Justice court is largely in the hands of the 
prosecutor. Any action we could have taken would not be 
very effective in the short space of two weeks and the evidence 
cannot be forced out in the open in such a short time. You 
can go ahead with your canvass, Mr. Albright, just as if no 
charges had been made.” 

“ I’m afraid there will be a whole lot of difficulty in doing 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 305 

that,” said Jim. “This thing is exploded to prevent that very 
procedure and to kill my candidacy and for no other purpose. 
These newspapers have already convicted me in the public 
estimation and they’re all over the county to-day. How¬ 
ever, we’ll go ahead and do the best we can.” 

It was anything but a cheerful little party that gathered 
in the hotel parlor to make arrangements to go to their several 
homes. Everyone saw the webwork of legal procedure that 
enveloped the case and that they couldn’t travel any faster 
than the court and the law would allow and that was too slow 
a pace altogether, but they were helpless. Montague and 
his party spoke their farewells and turned toward their home 
and Jim and Mary and their friends also prepared to go to 
their homes. 

“There’s no use in me going out to try and win votes in the 
face of this publicity,” said Jim. “I feel and see that there’s 
a change toward me. Even my friends doubt although they 
say nothing. In an organized attack like this the attacking 
party has all the advantage. They get their side all out 
first and create an opinion. Then I have not only to answer 
their charges but dissipate that fixed public opinion. My de¬ 
fence will never reach all the avenues of the public mind that 
this attack has already penetrated. Some people will always 
believe me guilty, as the newspapers practically say I am, be¬ 
cause they’ll never hear my defence. A fellow is all en¬ 
meshed in a web in a case of this kind. If I could only hit 
out I would feel all right, but I can’t strike back at anything. 
The enemy is invisible and you can’t hit what you can’t see. 
However, I’ll beat them when we can get them out in the 
open.” 

Jim’s father and mother and Mary’s father and mother had 
driven out and met them at the hotel. They had only heard 
of the trouble a short time before. All of them rode out home 
together and went into Judge Albright’s to hold a family 
council. Reverend Story, who rode out with them, went to 
his home to tell his wife the news. A sample copy of the 
Evening Clarion lay on his table. It was the same sample 


3 o6 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

that had gone into every home in the district and Jim’s case 
was on the front page. 

At the family supper table that night after the affair had 
been discussed from every angle and still remained as baffling 
as ever Judge Albright said: “You can pursue either one of 
two courses, Jim, as far as I see. You can go out and con¬ 
tinue your canvass and loudly deny the charges made against 
you. Your whole time will practically be taken up in making 
these denials. I gathered up all the newspapers and the 
whiskey element has got a pretty straight conviction in every 
one of them. All the big ones have scattered up and down 
the country the charges against you as practically proved al¬ 
ready. You have to meet that as an individual and an in¬ 
dividual can’t meet it and overcome it in the way you have 
to do. Your time would be mostly wasted. That’s what 
the whiskey crowd intended. Or you can pursue the other 
course of just going ahead here with your daily work as if 
nothing had happened till the case comes up in court. By 
doing this you escape much worry and useless effort and lose 
nothing.” 

“In any case,” said Mary, “I’d write a good strong letter 
to each of the newspapers at once and fling the charge back 
at them. They’ll print that even if they do sneer at it. I 
agree with your papa. I think it would be a waste of time to 
go out for the next two weeks. You can include in your 
letter that you’re as much in the race for sheriff as you ever 
were for they’ll spread the report by to-morrow that you’re 
out of the race. I’m sure it will be all over the district in two 
days and I’d counteract it by getting in my letter right away.” 
John Morton agreed with both Judge Albright and Mary and 
Jim decided that he would do as they outlined. The letter 
was written as they sat there and all made suggestions as 
to its form. Mary took it to the post office at once. 

The two weeks passed without any particular happenings. 
Jim went to town regularly to keep in touch with his lawyer. 
Neither he nor Mary showed any sign of the strain they were 
under. They went ahead with their church and Sunday- 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 307 

school work and evening school classes as usual. Their 
friends and neighbors treated them as before but Mary ex¬ 
pressed the feelings of the whole family one evening as they 
gathered at the supper table together, which they did now 
nearly every evening: “I feel that nearly all our friends have 
a doubt about the outcome of this trial. They don’t say so 
nor act so to us but I can sense in their talk that they think 
perhaps there’s something in this charge. The newspapers 
are so persistent in just as good as stating that they have com¬ 
plete proof that it has soaked into the public mind and even 
our Sunday-school scholars are impressed by this continued 
iteration. I’m satisfied the bulk of the people outside of our 
own circle of immediate friends are taking it for granted that 
Jim did write those letters and that they’re something awful. 
I’m stared at wherever I go and I can see strangers whispering 
together and it’s the same with Jim. We’re put in a semi¬ 
criminal class right now just as if we belonged there. I don’t 
suppose there could be any more trying situation than we 
have been forced into. I’ll be more than glad when it’s 
over. I’ll rejoice. We’ve got our character, our own 
knowledge and good estimate of ourselves, but we have lost, 
or are about to lose our reputation, the good opinion of 
other people. I can see how desperate a person might be¬ 
come when they have lost both character and reputation; 
sunk below the surface in their own estimation of themselves 
and also sunk down in the estimation of their friends.” 

“There’s no doubt,” said Jim, “but even our best friends, 
the people who know us and want to be with us, believe that 
I’ve done something that is the cause of all this uproar. 
Even Montague inquired carefully if there wasn’t something 
I had written or said that could be twisted around as a cause 
of the action these whiskeyites have taken and when I assured 
him I had neither written nor spoken anything at any time or 
place I could see a puzzled expression come over his face. 
He wanted to believe me but just couldn’t to the fullest ex¬ 
tent of belief. He could partly believe but not completely. 
He had that pertinacious doubt that he couldn’t drive away 


3 o8 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

although he tried his best to do so. It’s a study in doubt 
psychology. He would have felt relieved if I had recalled a 
letter or something I had said that reflected on the society 
ball and I know he would have come to my aid with the ut¬ 
most loyalty even if I had denounced the ball and its doings, 
but when I denied the charge in toto he was puzzled and it 
showed. If the publicity of this attack acts like that on him 
I don’t wonder at strangers believing everything that is 
stated. I’ve read it in the actions of the individuals of the 
public ever since we came to the city that night. Of course 
there’s a big crowd who want to believe it and would boost 
the charges and proclaim them as truth even if they knew 
them to be untrue for the sake of the effect on the election 
and because they’re opposed to my principles, which if put 
into effect would curtail their profits or put them out of busi¬ 
ness.” 

“You wouldn’t think anyone could possibly make such 
false charges even to save their business or make more 
money,” said Jim’s mother. 

“Well,” said the Judge, “we have proof that they will, 
right before us. I’m an old man now, at least an elderly 
man, and I’ve been all over North America and have seen all 
classes and conditions of people. If you tempt a man with 
six per cent, he’ll take a good mortgage and risk his money. 
If you tempt him with twelve per cent, he’ll invest and risk 
getting his interest and perhaps only some of his capital. 
If you tempt him with thirty or fifty per cent, he’ll risk the 
loss of his entire capital. If you tempt him with one hundred 
per cent, he’ll risk his capital and some deviations from the 
standard of law and morality. Raise the estimated win¬ 
nings to two hundred per cent, and he’ll go farther into the 
criminality business. Show him a glittering winning of one 
thousand or five thousand per cent, profit and he’ll break all 
laws, human and divine, commit or connive at any crime; 
bootlegging or forgery or embezzlement or murder or treason. 
Put the estimated reward at the very highest notch and the 
average humanity will go not only to the limit but far away 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 309 

beyond the limit; out into the crazy realms of dishonesty 
and lawbreaking where they have no earthly chance to save 
interest, capital, reputation, character, or soul. They get the 
excitement of the gamble and the retribution of the peni¬ 
tentiary or the gallows. I have learned this by observation 
in the hard school of a long experience among men. The most 
profound truth in all economic philosophy that the individual 
citizen can learn is included in two words: honesty pays. 
The church preaches it, the law preaches it, the business 
experience of the business world preaches it, the jail preaches 
it, the penitentiary and the gallows don’t preach it, they shout 
it through megaphones.” 

“It’s a wonder mankind doesn’t learn it and practise it,” 
said his wife. 

“Mankind does learn it, but it’s when it’s too late for the 
individual in the majority of cases. I learned it thoroughly 
by observing men for sixty years. The felon in the peniten¬ 
tiary learns it through crime; learns that criminality, which is 
dishonesty in its essence, doesn’t pay; but we are born babies 
not grownups and each baby has to learn everything anew. 
He can’t begin with the knowledge of his father and his 
father couldn’t begin with the knowledge of his grandfather. 
Each one of them had to learn for himself while lying in the 
cradle that he couldn’t possibly put his big toe in his mouth; 
that a flame or a hot stove would burn; that mankind is not 
civilized but is traveling toward civilization; that the Christian 
religion is a guide and an inspiration and that honesty pays. 
When mankind becomes fully civilized all human transac¬ 
tions between individuals and nations will be based on the 
maxim, honesty pays. Till we become fully civilized, both 
as individuals and nations, we’ll go on experimenting in dis¬ 
honesty and learning the truth of this maxim nine times out of 
ten too late.” 

“What seems to give us such a crushing blow is the attitude 
of the county prosecutor,” said Mary. “He represents the 
law and is looked on as the authority of the law, next to the 
judge. He asserts or is made to assert that we are guilty or 


3 io BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

that he has undoubted proofs of our guilt which is universally 
taken to mean that we are guilty. He’s supposed to be non¬ 
partisan and yet he heads the campaign of calumny against 
us.” 

“Law is not justice,” said Judge Albright. “Often it is 
not even the instrument of justice which it is presumed to be 
at all times in theory. When we all get civilized law will be 
justice and justice will be law. Men of all times have wanted 
this. The best public opinion of the world wants it to-day. 
In the most barbarous times; in the stone age and the flint 
age and the iron and copper age; through all the ages up to 
the present unsatisfactory age, with its complexities of in¬ 
dividual and social life, men have realized, first in glimmer¬ 
ings of theory and now in full expansion of theory, that justice 
should be law and law should be justice. But we are not 
advanced enough yet to make a complete unity between law 
and justice. We make general laws regarding criminal libel 
and courts and evidence and try to apply them to this partic¬ 
ular case and they’re too cumbersome in procedure to fit it. 
Any man of good common sense could call in all the parties to 
this case and hear the evidence and settle it as near justly 
as human judgment could dictate in two hours. The pro¬ 
cedure of the general laws will take two, three, four, or six 
months. The county prosecutor is using these general laws 
to make delays and trouble for us.” 

“And I understand,” continued Mary, “that he is a church 
member in good standing and is not considered one of the 
whiskey gang.” 

“Whiskey has a way of getting sympathetic help from 
thousands of our citizens who are outside the whiskey gangs. 
It makes it a business to reach them and use them. He has 
undoubtedly been reached.” 

“This disastrous trouble has brought home to me one 
thing,” said Jim. “I never realized before man’s irresponsi¬ 
ble changeableness and limited range of vision and knowledge 
and God’s unchangeableness and infinite view. Enemies 
and strangers find us guilty and neighbors and friends find us 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 311 

suspicious all on the spur of the moment and remain aloof 
or desert us or look coldly in our direction because they read 
innuendo charges in the newspapers; but God doesn’t change 
because the newspapers print falsehoods. He knows. We 
can go to him to-day just as we went a month ago in the full 
tide of our prosperity. I place more dependence on God and 
feel nearer to Him to-day than I did then. 

“I believe thoroughly now that trouble and sorrow may 
and do bring us closer to God than prosperity does. I can 
believe from a new viewpoint the Bible stories of how the 
Lord brought sortow to men to open their eyes to a realization 
of their dependence on Him. I see earthly woes now in a new 
light and it may be that they are for the best. They have a 
broader aspect when we realize that it is God’s will they 
should afflict us. These few days of real trouble have marked 
the beginning of an epoch in my life. I have greater spiritual 
longings than 1 had one month ago; greater faith; and en¬ 
larged sense of trust. The old religious life is divided from 
the new by these few days of tribulation and it may be that 
I have reason to thank God this has come.” 

“And I think it draws us all closer together,” said Mary. 
“The more the world draws away the more we understand 
and appreciate the home ties and the more we appreciate 
such sympathy as our Sunday-school scholars and the classes 
in the evening school give. Children and young people 
understand. They are better intuitive judges of human 
nature than their elders. Mrs. Wilson told me our Bible 
class had met at their house the other night when the Evening 
Clarion came and the whole class cried as they read it. I 
appreciate the sympathy we get a thousand times more than 
anything else that ever came to us from our people. And it’s 
more precious because of the utter helplessness of our boys 
and girls doing anything for us. I know they are praying for 
us night and day.” 

“Adversities have their uses,” said the Judge. “Now if 
you women will just pile up your dishes we’ll all go over to 
Reverend Story’s and pay them a social visit. There’s one 


312 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

place where we won’t get any cold looks or colder words. 
The country minister is a standby when you need a standby. 
I have learned that.” In a few minutes the dishes had 
been stacked up and they were all on their way to the 
parsonage. 


CHAPTER XIX 


T HE morning of the preliminary trial at last came. 
Jim’s family and friends drove in early. The country 
road was crowded with vehicles also going to the trial 
and at nine o’clock the court room and outside spaces were 
filled with people. The case had been advertised so com¬ 
pletely that it was a sensation like a circus or any other public 
event. It had lost its resemblance to a merely private in¬ 
dividual’s case in court. Jim and his attorney and his 
party made their way into the Justice’s office. The throng 
was so great that not even the women could be seated. A 
misdemeanor case had begun early and was soon finished. 
The county prosecutor appeared in it. 

The Justice then called the case of the State versus James 
Albright. There was intense silence both inside and outside. 
The attorneys had taken their places with Jim inside the 
railing and arranged their papers. 

“Your Honor,” said the prosecutor, rising at the head of 
the long table devoted to lawyers’ needs, “circumstances 
have arisen in this case that make it very inadvisable for the 
State to try this case in this court at a preliminary hear¬ 
ing. To properly protect our interests we wish to produce 
all our evidence at once which would not be advisable here 
and I’ve drawn up an information and have just filed it in 
the superior court charging the defendant, James Albright, 
with the crime of criminal libel. On behalf of the State I 
move that the case against James Albright in this court be 
dismissed.” He sat down. 

“Has the defence anything to say contravening this mo¬ 
tion?” asked the court. 

“Not a word,” said Jim’s attorney. “The case is now where 
3i3 


3 i 4 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

it belongs, in the superior court. We acquiesce.” Then 
turning to the county prosecutor he asked: “I suppose you’re 
willing that the same amount of bond shall be accepted in the 
superior court?” 

“Oh, yes,” answered the prosecutor. “We have no fears 
of Mr. Albright running away.” 

“The case is dismissed in this court and Mr. Albright is a 
free man as far as we are concerned,” said the Justice. 

The sheriff stepped up to Jim and said: “Mr. Albright, I 
have a warrant here issued out of the superior court for your 
arrest on a criminal libel charge.” 

“All right,” said Jim’s attorney who had busied himself at 
the table with the bond papers as soon as the prosecutor had 
made known his purpose. “Here are the appearance bonds 
all made out. The bondsmen are here and will sign.” Mon¬ 
tague and his friends were called forward again and signed 
the bonds. The sheriff put them in his pocket, bowed to 
Jim, and went out. 

“Call the parties in the next case, Mr. Constable,” said the 
Justice. The whole procedure had taken only a few minutes 
and was bewildering to those not used to such things and 
for ten minutes explanations were heard on all sides. 

“Our case is now in the superior court. We’ll look over 
the information and see what’s in it. Bring all your folks 
into superior court room number one. It is empty to-day. 
I will be there in a few minutes,” said Jim’s lawyer. 

Jim and his party went into the court room indicated. 
“This case,” said the attorney as he entered, “has taken a 
course that we thought it might take and we were prepared 
for. The prosecutor has made two weeks’ unnecessary delay 
by beginning in the Justice court and then dismissing it there 
and now we are just where we started but we are in the 
superior court under the same bonds with the same charge 
filed against us. We have here the complaint, which we call 
an information, but it doesn’t give us much insight into the 
evidence that will be produced. It does give a letter which 
Mr. Albright is charged with writing and publishing to the 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 315 

world by sending it to the newspapers. The letter criticizes 
the dress and deportment generally, and especially the danc¬ 
ing deportment, of all the society ladies at the late ball 
and says they were all drinking liquor and some of them were 
intoxicated. It particularly names four of them. ,, He then 
read the letter. “Outside of this, there is nothing to show 
the evidence on which the charge is based. Here is a list of 
witnesses the State will use. We’ll see them.” 

“There can’t be any such evidence,” said Jim. “Neither 
that letter nor any letter of any kind was written or sent 
by me to any newspaper or to anyone else on the face of the 
earth. It’s a clear put-up job.” 

“Well, that’s the charge we have to meet in a jury trial,” 
said the attorney. “We could object to this information in 
several particulars but that would make delay and play into 
the hands of the enemy. It may be that they drew up a 
faulty information with that end in view. It might be that 
the delay would be more serious than the trial itself. The 
prosecution probably intends to delay this trial so it can’t 
come up at this term of court. I should judge so by the delay 
in the Justice court. We have to fight for an immediate 
trial as well as fight at the trial. The prosecution had every¬ 
thing its own way in procedure in the Justice court but here 
we will have a say. We’ll go into the court now and offer to 
plead and ask that the case be assigned for trial at this term. 
If we don’t get in early with it we may have a three months’ 
delay.” 

“That would be fatal,” said Jim. “The primary election 
would be all over and I would be out of the race. I’m be¬ 
ginning to see daylight now through the complete darkness.” 

They all went into the next court room where the superior 
judge was holding court and where the prosecutor was busy 
in a case. “Just after intermission we’ll have a chance to 
address the court,” whispered the lawyer. An intermission 
of fifteen minutes was soon called by the court and he left 
the bench and went back into his room. 

“We’re going to ask the court’s permission to plead in the 


316 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

Albright case. I suppose you are willing,” said Jim’s 
lawyer, rising and addressing the prosecutor as the Judge re¬ 
sumed the bench. 

“Oh, certainly,” said the prosecutor. “I intended to have 
that done the middle of next week as we have a bunch of 
indictments at that time but there’s no objection now if the 
court is willing to take the time.” 

“Your Honor,” said the attorney, “an information has 
just been filed charging the defendant here, James Albright, 
with criminal libel. I represent the defendant. He wishes 
to plead to the information now if your Honor would favor 
us by giving that much time to this case.” He then entered 
into an explanation of the emergency that existed. 

“Any objection, Mr. Prosecutor?” asked the Judge. 

“None, your Honor.” 

“Let the defendant be arraigned,” said the Judge. “Mr. 
Albright, stand up, please.” Jim stood up beside his attorney 
in front of the Judge’s desk and the prosecutor standing there 
also read every syllable of the information. The Judge 
listened carefully. “Are you guilty or not guilty, Mr. Al¬ 
bright?” he asked. 

“Not guilty,” said Jim. 

“Your plea is entered. When shall we set this case for trial, 
Mr. Prosecutor?” said the court. 

“If the court please I prefer to take up that phase of the 
case later on after I’ve looked over our evidence.” 

“I suggest that it be taken up to-morrow as it is motion 
day in court,” said Jim’s attorney. 

“That will be the order. Proceed with the case in hand,” 
said the Judge as he settled back in his chair. 

Again Jim was out of court in a bewildering manner to 
him and his party. They filed out. “To-morrow our fight 
against delay begins,” said the attorney. “We won the first 
round right now. We’ve got your case ready for the docket. 
Now I’m in favor of not making any fight on the information 
although it’s plainly defective. If we do it surely means a 
delayed trial. I’ve seen all of their witnesses except Judge 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 317 

Albright and they all refuse to give me any information. 
They say they’ll testify when they come into court but not 
before. If they have a letter it was either written with a 
pen or pencil or typewriter. If their letter is written with 
a pen or pencil we can show forgery. No amateur can forge a 
whole letter and get away with it. But how about that type¬ 
writer you spoke about? You said the sheriff took it.” 

“Yes, while I was away. He gave a receipt for it written 
on the machine at the time. Here it is. What he wanted 
with the machine he didn’t say except that it was connected 
with this case.” 

“It’s a typewritten letter then. We can get the machine 
back probably but I doubt if it’s worth while trying. How¬ 
ever, we want to look over this sample of its work at our 
leisure. Now you come to the court house at ten to-morrow 
and we’ll find out who wins the next round.” 

That evening there were the usual callers at Delker’s 
office. “I see,” said Delker, “that Big Jim is forcing the 
trial at this jury term. Too bad that this thing came to a 
head so soon. If it had only been a few weeks later it would 
have gone over the election without a doubt.” 

“How do you mean forcing a trial?” asked Red Barth. 

“Runyon had him plead to-day. That means his case will 
be ready for the jury term unless the prosecutor can stave it 
off and I don’t believe he can. He’s not in the Justice court 
now. However, let him force a trial as much as he pleases. 
We’ve got the goods on him to convict or at least make a 
divided jury, which is just as good for us as a verdict of 
guilty. We’re keeping out of sight and letting the case take 
its course but we’re bombarding the country every day. Not a 
day has passed since he was arrested that some of the news¬ 
papers haven’t put an article in every house in the district 
regarding this case. They’re written by an expert sent here 
for that purpose and Jim can’t be elected sheriff after being 
razooed that way. He wrote a letter to the newspapers deny¬ 
ing everything. We saw to it that that letter was printed 
in only a few papers that went to him and his friends. The 


318 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

women are just as mad as they were at the start and are 
getting madder. We’ve got Big Jim in a hole and we’ll keep 
him there. Bob has done everything he could to put it 
over.” 

The next day was lawyers’ day at the court house. There 
were no trials but the Judge heard and disposed of motions in 
the different cases and with the attorneys arranged the cases 
on his docket for trial and transacted other detail business 
of the court. When Jim and his party arrived lawyers nearly 
filled the court room and arguments were being heard on 
various matters. 

When his case was reached his attorney announced that they 
were ready for trial and asked that the case be set for trial. 

“Are you ready for trial, Mr. Prosecutor?” asked the Judge. 

“We are not,” said the prosecutor as he arose. “We need 
time for preparation and request that this case go over till a 
later date.” 

Attorney Runyon was on his feet at once. He reviewed the 
delayed proceedings from the beginning in the Justice court 
and stated in a fifteen-minute talk the reasons why the case 
should be docketed at once. This included a review of the 
political situation as it affected Jim and showed how delay 
might automatically eliminate him from the race for sheriff. 

“Unless there’s some good reason, Mr. Prosecutor, for put¬ 
ting this case over I would be in favor of setting it for trial one 
week from to-day,” said the Judge. “I’m strongly impressed 
with the arguments of the defendant’s attorney for an early 
hearing.” 

“I doubt if we can be ready, your Honor. We will do the 
best we can but may have to ask for more time.” 

“The case is set for one week from to-day,” said the Judge, 
entering it on his docket. “We will consider the plea for 
more time when it is made.” 

“We’ve got your case set for trial at last,” said Attorney 
Runyon as they left the court house, “and we haven’t a thing 
to go on except your word. That’s all we have on our side. 
We have gone over the typewriter question. This machine 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 319 

of yours has special features that identify its writing. Any¬ 
thing written on it can be identified at once. We have de¬ 
cided that possession of the machine itself means little or 
nothing and we’re not going to take steps to recover it which 
might cause delay. All we can do now is wait and watch and 
riddle their evidence; picking up any points that we can find in 
the meantime. We can get delay enough during the trial 
by some means or other to make any short investigation we 
may need to make. Have you anything to suggest, Mr. 
Albright ?” 

“Not a thing in the world,” said Jim. “It has been an 
unsolvable puzzle to me from the beginning and I’m just as 
much in the dark now as I was the first day.” 

“Well, if anything turns up let us know at once and call 
in our office every other day. The prosecutor may be able 
to stand this case oflF for one week longer but that will be all. 
The court is manifestly with us and I think he’ll recognize 
that and not try any more dilatory tactics.” 

The journey home was a repetition of the other journeys 
home only Big Jim and his people were getting used to it now 
and they felt really better than usual at the thought that the 
end of the long suspense was in sight. 

Jim made his journeys to town; the week rolled around and 
nothing new developed. The morning of the trial came. 
The prosecutor had made no further motions or pleas and it 
was accepted as a fact that he would go ahead with the trial. 
“You can’t tell for sure that the trial will come off as sched¬ 
uled,” said Runyon, “until it starts. It may be delayed 
one more week but I think not.” 

Jim and his family were on hand early at the court house 
on trial day. By the time they arrived the court room was 
filled and the crowd extended out into all the corridors and 
down the stairway. The first four rows of seats in the court 
room were occupied by women, smartly costumed society 
women, leaders in the city social life, the attenders of the 
society ball, whom it was charged Jim’s letters maligned. 
They had made arrangements for the seats beforehand. 


320 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

Probably none of them had ever been at a trial before. The 
event to them was a chance to broaden their sensations as 
well as listen while their legal champion vindicated their 
honor and brought due punishment to their slanderer. It 
was akin to an opening theatre night or any other spectacular 
entertainment and they were alert and evidently pleased 
at the chance to see and hear a tragedy in real life. 

They had seen tragedies on the stage but this was different. 
They had already been promised that a big, strong man, 
in the prime of young, life, a Christian leader, a church mem¬ 
ber of high standing, a foremost local citizen, a member of a 
highly respected family, married into a highly respected 
family, highly respected himself because of his intelligence 
and hitherto unblemished character, should be turned into a 
common criminal before their eyes. He would be degraded 
from the caste of man to the caste of the lowly felon and would 
be led to a stone cell by an officer of the law. The verdict of 
guilty would hang around his neck like a heavy weight and 
he would totter from the court room, banished for all time 
from the comradeship of respectable society. Sorry, yes! 
But didn’t he bring it all on himself and wasn’t it the law 
that was setting the stage and not their society club? They 
couldn’t help it even if they wanted to and if he deserved the 
punishment let the law takes its course. Thumbs down! 

By nine o’clock the crowd overflowed in all directions; there 
were more people outside than in. Jim’s attorney arrived 
and found seats inside the railing near the lawyers’ table 
for Jim and his people. Lawyers filled the space inside the 
railing. The unusual event had brought many more of them 
out than commonly attended. The jurymen who had to be 
called were then piloted by a bailiff in among the lawyers 
where they were jammed in a mass. Exactly at nine o’clock 
the Judge in his usual official robes emerged from his room 
and ascended the steps to the elevated seat where he sat. 
Everyone in the court room rose as he entered and remained 
standing till he was seated. A bailiff near the door announced 
in a loud tone the words of the ancient British legal litany 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 321 

for court opening which has come down from the long past; a 
thousand years or more beginning with, “Oyez! Oyez!” 
The Judge took his seat and the audience sat down. 

“The case of the State against James Albright/’ announced 
the court after looking at his docket. “Are you ready for 
trial?” 

“ Ready, your Honor,” said the prosecutor. 

“Ready for trial, your Honor,” said Attorney Runyon. 

“Call the jury,” said the Judge. There was a bustle in the 
room as the clerk called the names of twelve jurymen and 
they came forward and took their seats in the jury box which 
was railed off to the right of the Judge, two rows of six seats 
each, the rear row being raised slightly higher than the front 
one. Between the Judge and the jury was the witness chair, 
on a level with the Judge’s seat. In front of this chair and 
close to it was the court stenographer’s chair and small desk. 
The clerk of the court sat to his left, immediately in front 
of the Judge’s dais. The lawyer’s long table extended out 
near the jury to the railing which ran all along the front of 
the room and separated the court participants from the public. 
The prosecutor took his place at the left front of the long 
table. His assistant sat behind him. They had the place of 
honor close to the jury. Attorney Runyon took the right- 
hand side of the front opposite to the prosecutor. Jim was 
given the seat behind him so that he would be close for con¬ 
sultation. Mary and the family got seats in front of the 
railing. 

“Proceed,” said the Judge. The prosecutor interrogated 
the first juryman as to his name, residence, citizenship, and 
other jury qualifications as required by the state jury law. 
Then he asked him as to his acquaintance with the defendant; 
if he had heard or read of the case; if he had formed an opin¬ 
ion as to the guilt or innocence of the defendant from what he 
had heard or read; if that opinion were fixed or if it were only 
an impression; and so on through the routine of questions 
usually asked jurymen in criminal cases. 

Five of the jury boldly stated they had formed fixed opin- 


322 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

ions that they could not entirely lay aside. These were 
excused by the court at the request of the prosecutor as dis¬ 
qualified for jury duty. As the prosecutor finished question¬ 
ing each man and found him not disqualified he said: “I pass 
Mr. So and So “for cause.” The same juryman was then 
questioned by Attorney Runyon along the same lines or any 
new lines he might wish to interrogate him and he also 
passed him “for cause.” Sometimes the Judge took a hand 
in the questioning. Five new jurymen were called in the 
places of the five who. were excused and they went through 
the same interrogation. The whole procedure was for the 
purpose of weeding out the jurors who had a bias or prejudice 
or were influenced by some reason or cause so that they could 
not try the case fairly. 

Then the State, represented by the prosecutor, had three 
peremptory challenges and the defendant, represented by 
his attorney, had twice as many: that is each of them could 
object to that many jurors serving on that jury without giving 
any reason for their request. When they objected the juror 
was excused at once by the court and a new juror called in 
his place. This is also an old English law custom coming 
down probably from King Alfred’s time. The State chal¬ 
lenged two in this manner and Attorney Runyon challenged 
three. 

Usually such an examination grows wearisome as the hours 
go by in long-drawn-out repetitions, but there was such in¬ 
tense interest in Jim’s case and so many people directly 
interested that the same keen attention was paid up to the 
very last minute as was displayed at the beginning. It 
was five o’clock in the afternoon before the prosecutor an¬ 
nounced: “We accept the jury, your Honor.” 

“We also accept the jury, your Honor,” said Attorney 
Runyon. 

“Swear the jury,” said the Judge. The jurymen stood up 
and the clerk of the court swore them in the ancient lingo 
of the British courts: “To well and truly try the case wherein 
the State was the plaintiff and James Albright defendant 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 323 

and a true verdict render according to the evidence and the 
law as construed by the court.” ‘‘It’s time to close court for 
the day,” said the Judge. He then gave instructions to the 
bailiffs as to the care of the jury and adjourned court till 
nine o’clock the next morning. 

“The jury is pretty well mixed,” said Bush to Delker as 
they walked toward home after being very interested ob¬ 
servers all through the day. 

“Yes, and it’s a case where we gain nothing by showing bias 
or technicality and trying too hard to get a wet jury. The 
majority of the jury venire, that is the whole bunch, are pro- 
hibs because the prohibs have the majority of the whole 
voters of the county from which the names of the jury are 
drawn. We’ve got enough of a sprinkling of our liberals on 
the entire list so that you can’t get a jury of twelve men with¬ 
out having some one or more who will not convict in a liquor 
case and that’s all we ask. A divided jury is as good for us 
as an acquittal in the average whiskey case. In this case 
we’re going to put up straight evidence from beginning to end. 
I consider this is a fair-minded jury who will respect their 
oaths. On the evidence they can hardly get away from con¬ 
victing. If Big Jim is convicted by a jury of mostly his own 
people he’s doubly done; sunk so deep that he can never 
under any circumstances come to the surface again. If they 
don’t convict we have enough men on that jury to stand for 
conviction for all time and it will be a divided jury; which is 
practically as good for us. If he stands neither convicted nor 
acquitted with a new trial facing him next term on the same 
charge his candidacy is killed just the same as if he were con¬ 
victed. We’ve got a cinch any way you look at it. The 
cards are stacked and it’s our deal. Big Jim is a thing of the 
past in the political world and we don’t care a whoop for him 
as an individual. We builded better than we knew when we 
started on this track.” 

At nine o’clock the next morning all the crowd of the day 
before were in their places and they were augmented by a 
greater overflowing in the corridors and outside than there 


3 2 4 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

had been the day previous. Court opened with the same 
routine formality. 

“Call the roll,” said the Judge. The clerk called the roll of 
the jurors and they all answered: “Present.” “Proceed,” 
said the Judge, nodding to the prosecutor. He arose and 
made his opening statement to the jury. It was evident 
from his statement that he was not going to reveal any of the 
evidence till he had to. He used the opportunity given him 
more to buttress his case by indirect argument than to present 
the facts he intended to prove. On one point he said: “The 
court will tell you in his instructions what ‘criminal libel* is 
and what the legal term ‘publishing* a criminal libel means. 
That these letters constitute criminal libel there is no doubt. 
The defence in this case has conceded this point for they have 
not raised the question. Our evidence is altogether cir¬ 
cumstantial. The court will instruct you that circum¬ 
stantial evidence is good evidence; is to be credited with the 
same value as direct testimony of witnesses provided it is 
properly connected in a coherent manner. It is binding on 
a jury to accept it as trustworthy evidence in such a case 
under the oath they have taken as jurors. We will proceed 
with our proof at once without detailing it in this statement.** 
He sat down and the court nodded to Attorney Rlnyon. 
He arose and said: “In view of the fact that the prosecutor 
hasn’t outlined what is intended to be proved, which is a very 
unusual proceeding, the defence reserves any statement it 
wishes to make till after the prosecution gets through pre¬ 
senting its evidence.** 

“Call the first witness,** said the Judge. “Horace Bush,** 
said the prosecutor. Bush stepped to the witness chair and 
was sworn by the clerk. 

“Mr. Bush, what is your occupation?** 

“Editor of the Daily Clarion of this city.*’ 

“1*11 ask you to state when and where you first saw this 
letter if you ever did see it?** 

“That letter came in the evening mail to our office on July 
seventh; addressed as on the envelope to ‘The Editor of the 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 325 

Daily Clarion The night editor opened the envelope and 
laid it on my desk. I opened the envelope and took the 
letter from it. I noted at the time that the envelope was 
postmarked ‘Cardon.’ ” 

“What did you do with this letter?” 

“Turned it over to the county attorney.” 

“Why did you not print it?” 

“It’s libelous in language and reflected on people whom I 
esteem.” 

“I now present this letter to the attorney for the defence 
for inspection and request that it be marked plaintiff's 
exhibit number one and I offer it in evidence.” 

“We object to the introduction of this letter in evidence,” 
said Attorney Runyon, rising to his feet. “There is nothing 
in it or around it that in any way connects it with the de¬ 
fendant.” 

“We will show the connection later. We can’t introduce 
all our evidence at once,” said the prosecutor. “The letter 
is accepted as offered under the condition that it will be con¬ 
nected with the case later as stated by the prosecutor,” ruled 
the Judge. “Mr. Bush, did you make any effort to find out 
who wrote the letter?” continued the prosecutor. 

“I did not. I called in three of the gentlemen whose wives 
were mentioned in the letter: Messrs. Reyland, Caledon, and 
Smith, and showed it to them. They began an investigation 
and found out.” 

“What did they find out?” 

“We object,” interjected Runyon, “to the admission of 
this hearsay evidence.” 

“Objection sustained unless proper reasons are shown why 
it should be admitted,” ruled the court. “Take the witness,” 
said the prosecutor. 

“Mr. Bush,” said Runyon, “how do you identify this letter 
as being the one you received?” 

“By the letter itself which I remember well and by the 
two small marks on the back at the lower right-hand corner. 
That is my name in shorthand. I placed it there.” 


326 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

“How do you know this letter came in your mail?” 

“The office mail boy got our mail from the post office and 
left it all on my desk to be opened. This letter was one of the 
letters he brought in that morning.” 

“We excuse the witness for the present,” said Runyon, 
“with the request that we may recall him later if this letter 
is connected with the case.” 

“If there’s no objection that will be agreed to,” said the 
court. 

“Call Stribling,” said the prosecutor. Mr. Stribling, editor 
of Evening Topics , was sworn. His testimony was a dupli¬ 
cate of Bush’s. The defence excused him with the same 
request for a recall. 

“Call William Caledon,” said the prosecutor. Mr. Caledon 
was sworn. “Mr. Caledon,” said the prosecutor, “was this 
defendant, James Albright, at the society ball as an onlooker 
on July fourth this year?” 

“Yes. I saw him there. He was in the kitchen with an¬ 
other party talking to the cook about half-past eleven.” 

“Mr. Caledon, you were called in along with Messrs. Rey- 
land and Smith by Mr. Bush to look at a certain letter on 
the evening of July seventh, were you not?” 

“Yes.” 

“What did you do with regard to finding out who wrote that 
letter?” 

“We looked it over and called in Mr. Harrison, a typewriter 
expert, to help us. He found that the letter was written 
on one certain machine and that no other machine would 
produce the same letter; also that it was written on a certain 
peculiar kind of paper. We hired him to find that machine 
and that paper. He did find them and we have them.” 

“Where did he find the machine?” 

“We object,” said Runyon, “hearsay evidence.” 

“Objection sustained,” ruled the court. “Take the wit¬ 
ness,” said the prosecutor. 

“Did you or your friends, Reyland and Smith, do anything 
toward finding that machine yourselves,” asked Runyon. 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 


32 7 


“No, nothing!” 

“We excuse the witness with the same reservation,” said 
Runyon. 

“Agreed, if there’s no objection,” said the court. 

“Call William Harrison,” said the prosecutor. Harrison 
was sworn. “Mr. Harrison, what is your business?” 

“General Typewriter Agent for this northwestern district.” 

“What experience have you had with typewriters?” 

“I learned the machinist trade as an apprentice and then 
worked two years for the Remington’s in New York state 
as a typewriter mechanic and have learned to run several 
kinds of typewriters. I was stenographer and typist for a 
general agent in Detroit for two years.” 

“You know typewriters?” 

“I could make them and then run them.” 

“On the evening of July seventh you were called in and 
hired by Messrs. Caledon, Reyland, and Smith to help in¬ 
vestigate a certain letter. Go ahead in your own way and 
tell us all that you did.” 

“I went to the office of the Daily Clarion where these gentle¬ 
men were. They presented me the letter and said they 
wanted to know what I saw in it. I said it was written on a 
number five Excelsior machine because it was that type. 
Other machines don’t have that shape and size of letters. 
It was written on an old worn machine which was very dirty. 
The face of the letters hadn’t been cleaned for a long time. 
The letter was skilfully written, either by an expert typist or 
a common typist who took great care. The letter ‘n’ was 
slanting at a different angle from the other letters. The 
stem of this letter had evidently got slightly bent. The letter 
V was not in alignment with the other letters. Either its 
stem was adjusted wrong or it was bent. The circle of the ‘o’ 
was cut clear through at the upper right-hand corner. The 
capital ‘E’ was defective in the lower cross bar. The ribbon 
used was pink. The carbon used was either new or nearly 
so. The adjustment of the capital ‘T’ was such that the 
lower part of the letter was cut off in the impression. Prob- 


328 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

ably the other capitals around it were also out of adjust¬ 
ment but the capital ‘T’ was the one that was used in this 
letter. 

“I went out to find the machine for there was only one 
machine that would satisfy all these deviations. I found 
that the paper on which the letter was written was a very 
rare letter paper made in Massachusetts. It was a very 
thick, velvety, expensive paper such as you don’t see nowa¬ 
days. It had been made and sold years ago. It had a special 
water mark running through it and could be easily identified 
if found. I tested machines all over the city and investigated 
the wholesale and retail paper stocks but didn’t find either 
the machine or the paper. I went out in the country and at 
last found both machine and paper in the home of Mr. James 
Albright. Under the excuse that I was a typewriter repairer 
I had Judge Albright show me the typewriter. Mr. and 
Mrs. James Albright were away at the time. 

“I found the typewriter in a room that had been used as 
an office. The typewriter was on a stand by a desk. It was 
covered with a tin typewriter cover which was locked with 
a small lock. Judge Albright used a key from among a bunch 
on a key ring he took from his pocket to unlock the machine 
and he also unlocked the desk with a key from the same 
bunch. I took the paper from a small compartment in the 
desk, labeled ‘Church Notices.’ I tested the machine on 
this paper. It was the same machine that wrote the letter 
I saw in the Clarion office and it was the same letter paper. 
I also took from a compartment in the desk an envelope 
which was the same kind of an envelope as that used in mail¬ 
ing these letters. It is a very rare envelope. I turned my 
test sample in to the men who hired me along with my re¬ 
port.” 

“Is this the test sample you used?” asked the prosecutor, 
picking out a paper from among his files. 

“Yes, that is my test sample made in Mr.Albright’s house. 
You see every mark and deviation I mentioned and I prob¬ 
ably could pick out others by taking more time.” 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 329 

“Did you and Judge Albright have any conversation as to 
who owned the machine and paper and who used this type¬ 
writer ?” 

“Yes, he told me that he bought the desk and typewriter 
years ago for himself. He had given them to his son later 
after he came from business college. That was how he had a 
key to both locks. His son also had keys which he carried 
with him. Judge Albright said he had not used the machine 
for years; that his son was the only one who used it; that his 
son’s wife, Mrs. Albright, couldn’t typewrite. I made a 
remark about the fine paper and he said it was paper bought 
at a bargain rate by the church ten years before out of a 
special stock that had been lying on a retailer’s shelves and 
which the ordinary buyer didn’t use. It was used in sending 
out church notices by his son who was a church official.” 

“I now offer again the letter in evidence as being fully identi¬ 
fied and also offer this test sample of letter paper in evidence 
and request that it be marked plaintiff’s exhibit number two,” 
said the prosecutor. He placed both in the hands of Attor¬ 
ney Runyon. 

“We object,” said Runyon, “to the admission of these 
papers for the reason before stated that the defendant in 
this case has not been shown to be connected with them in 
any manner. And for the further reason that it has not even 
been proved that the letter was the product of this partic¬ 
ular typewriter. It is still an open question as to whether 
this letter might not have been written on a hundred other 
machines.” 

“Before the court rules I wish to ask the witness another 
question or two,” said the prosecutor. “Mr. Harrison, is it 
possible that this letter could have been written on any 
other typewriter than the one you found in the house of 
James Albright?” 

“All things are possible I’ve been told with God, but my 
opinion as a typewriter expert is that there is not another 
typewriter on earth to-day that will produce an exact copy 
of that letter with all its marks and differences peculiar to 


330 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

that machine. I know there is not such another typewriter 
in the world.” 

“ And was it at the home of this defendant, James Albright, 
sitting here behind his attorney, that you found this machine 
and this paper?” 

“It was in his house in the presence of his father.” 

“And now,” said the prosecutor to the court, “I again 
offer both letter and paper in evidence.” 

“The same objections,” said Runyon. “I will admit both 
at this time as evidence to go before the jury although there 
is some merit in the objections made. The defence has the 
full privilege, however, of presenting their objections in 
evidentiary form.” 

“Would you know the machine if you saw it again?” the 
prosecutor asked. 

“Yes.” 

“Mr. Sheriff, will you kindly bring that typewriter here?” 
The sheriff, who was sitting inside the rail with a typewriter 
balanced on his knees, brought it to the lawyer’s table. “Is 
this the machine, Mr. Harrison?” The witness deftly 
rolled a sheet of paper in it and the machine fairly sung as he 
typed three lines. 

“That’s the machine. I couldn’t be mistaken in it. It’s 
half paralyzed. You can’t make it work by touching the 
keys; you have to hammer them.” 

“Take the witness,” said the prosecutor. Attorney 
Runyon cross-examined Harrison over the ground of his 
direct testimony at length but got practically nothing further 
than his statements to the prosecution showed. He had been 
a disinterested party; just a hired man throughout and made 
a good impression as a witness. 

“Will you take the witness stand, Mr. Sheriff?” said 
the prosecutor to the sheriff. He was sworn. “Where 
did you get this typewriter which you produced here in 
court ?” 

“At the home of the defendant in this case, James Al¬ 
bright.” 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 331 

“Did you take it in your possession there yourself and 
have you kept it in your own possession since that time?” 

“Yes. I took it from there and have kept it in my safe.” 

“Where did you find it?” 

“On a stand, locked in its case, next to a desk in a room in 
his house.” 

“Who unlocked the typewriter case?” 

“Judge Albright.” 

“Take the witness,” said the prosecutor. 

“How did you come to go there after a typewriter?” asked 
Runyon. 

“The county attorney asked me to go out and get this 
typewriter. He said if I could not get it by requesting its 
possession he would furnish me authority for taking it. 
Judge Albright gave it to me on my request.” 

“Will you swear Mr. James Anderson?” said the prosecu¬ 
tor. “Mr. Anderson,” he asked as the witness was seated 
after being sworn, “what is your occupation?” 

“Postmaster at Cardon.” 

“On July seventh did you see this defendant in this case, 
James Albright, who sits here behind his attorney, mail any 
letters at your office ?” 

“Yes, he was there about nine-thirty or ten o’clock in the 
morning and mailed some letters and got the family mail.” 

“What time does the mail come from Cardon to this city?” 

“It leaves Cardon at seven in the morning and three-thirty 
in the afternoon.” 

“Did you notice where the letters were addressed that Mr. 
Albright mailed ?” 

“No!” 

“That’s all.” 

“No questions,” said Runyon. 

“We will take a fifteen-minute intermission,” said the 
court. “I have a motion to hear in another case. The 
bailiff will escort the jury to the jury room.” The jury 
marched out in double file; the Judge left the bench and the 
buzz of conversation began in the room. 


332 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

Jim and his father and his attorneys went into one of the 
other rooms. “ Could anyone on earth get access to that 
typewriter ?” asked Runyon. 

“No one that I know of,” said Jim. Judge Albright 
shook his head in acquiescence. 

“We can’t hopefully attack Harrison’s statements,” said 
Runyon. “There’s not a stenographer in the city that will 
not corroborate him. Now, we have your testimony and 
we can work in a conspiracy charge at least indirectly. I have 
clipped every newspaper attack on you since your arrest 
and have a stack of them. We can’t get them in as evidence 
perhaps but can refer to them many times. We’re short on 
direct evidence but the jury must be convinced beyond a 
reasonable doubt and we’ll raise the reasonable doubt. All 
their evidence is circumstantial. They couldn’t possibly get 
any direct evidence either. We’ll make a fight on the grounds 
of your denials of writing any letters; on your reputation and 
on the reasonable doubt clause. That’s the best we can do.” 

Court reconvened. “We have the name of Judge Albright 
on our witness list but will not call him. We rest our case,” 
said the prosecutor. 

Instantly Runyon was on his feet. “I move that the jury 
be instructed by the court to bring in a verdict of acquittal,” 
and he went on to state at length his reasons which were that 
the prosecution had failed to prove the defendant wrote the 
letters in question or mailed them to the newspapers stated 
in the information. He made an extended argument evi¬ 
dently intended more for the jury than the court as he 
branched out in all directions bringing in Jim’s character and 
reputation and all the side issues that could possibly be talked 
about. The prosecutor answered him at considerable length. 

“The motion is denied,” said the Judge when they had 
finished. “The evidence as presented is for the jury to pass 
on and the court will allow the case to go to the jury. We 
will adjourn for dinner. The jury will be taken to any 
restaurant designated by the sheriff if there’s no objections 
from the attorneys.” 


333 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

“None whatever!” said the attorneys on both sides. 
The bailiffs were instructed as to their duties and the jury 
marched out with them to their dinner. 

The big mass of people melted away in countless dis¬ 
cussions. “A strong case,” said Delker to his crowd as they 
went down the street. “There’s not a crack or a leak in it. 
One fact follows another in logical order. You can’t get 
away from that locked-up typewriter and locked-up paper 
and no one else having a key and Big Jim at the ball and 
mailing mail, and these letters that couldn’t have been 
written on any other machine arriving in that very mail. I 
tell you it’s a cinch. It’s a conviction. It can’t be an ac¬ 
quittal.” 

“His attorneys are going to put up an awful fight in an in¬ 
direct manner,” said Bush. “Did you catch on to that talk 
to the jury through the Judge for a directed verdict? That’s 
good work. There’s going to be a lot of that kind of fighting 
this afternoon.” 

“Yes, but it isn’t evidence.” 

“That’s right, too. The Judge’s instructions will sand bag 
a lot of wind out of that kind of oratory but there are times 
when wind counts. I agree with you that circumstantial 
evidence couldn’t be more logically laid down.” 

Jim and his party went to dinner by themselves. “They’ve 
got it framed up pretty strong,” said Judge Albright. “Every 
detail has been attended to except fixing the jury. They 
haven’t fixed that jury.” 

“It’s amazing,” said Jim, “how that letter could have been 
written on my machine. They must have another machine 
that they made an exact duplicate of mine but how could 
they do that either? Mine has been locked up in my house 
and we haven’t had even a hired girl. It’s a riddle to me.” 

“I don’t see how such a job could be fixed up and carried 
out,” said Mary, “and it’s all false and trick from beginning 
to end. How are we going to meet it, Jim?” 

“I don’t know, I’m sure. We have no evidence. I can say 
I didn’t write the letters but I can’t prove it. However, 


334 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

little girl,” he said as he put his arm around her, “I’m not 
going to despair because these forces of evil are attacking 
me. I’ve got the truth and honesty on my side and the Lord 
is with me even though I can’t see him for the clouds the evil 
ones have raised. I trust in him more and more every hour; 
more this morning than I did last night; more now at noon 
than I did this morning. These fellows can beat me alone 
but they can’t beat me when I have all the invisible forces of 
righteousness with me. I’ll win in the end no matter who 
wins now. So cheer up, little girl. I’m going to eat as much 
right now as if I were coasting along on the top of a wave of 
prosperity.” 

The party had all been downcast; almost hopeless as the 
crushing force of the forenoon’s evidence had sunk into their 
minds. The evidence was all impersonal and all logical. 
They knew it was trickery but how was it done ? Even if it 
was trickery the result was sworn evidence presented in court 
and made a most damaging case that had to be met in some 
logical way. Mary had been almost in tears; would have 
been crying like a child only circumstances forbade it. 
Her mother and Jim’s mother also were stunned and the 
lines on the faces of Judge Albright and John Morton had 
set grimmer than they were at nine o’clock in the morning. 
Jim’s faith and hopefulness were contagious and cheered 
them up and they had a good dinner. 

Runyon walked away from the court house with one of his 
partners who had been fighting another case in another 
court room. “We haven’t anything to fight on except 
reasonable doubt,” said Runyon, speaking more to himself 
than to his companion. “The Judge will say to that jury ‘this 
man is presumed innocent; you must be convinced beyond 
a reasonable doubt that he is guilty.’ We must create that 
reasonable doubt and hammer on it. We’re fighting with 
our backs to the wall and we have nothing but our bare fists; 
not a weapon of any kind; we have to find our own rocks that 
we hurl. However, I suppose we can lay hands on something 
to throw.” 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 335 

“Mr. James Albright will be sworn,” said Runyon, when 
court reconvened. Jim took the witness stand. Runyon 
began by leading Jim on to tell the story of his life at con¬ 
siderable length. The prosecutor didn’t interfere except now 
and then he broke in with a side remark about how little this 
had to do with the case but when Jim reached the point 
where he began to talk about his campaign and incidentally 
to show how the liquor interests were opposed to him as his 
attorney paved the way the legal fireworks began. Time 
and again in reply to objections by the prosecutor, which the 
court generally sustained, Runyon got in long argumentative 
statements as to the liquor conspiracy against Jim and got 
an opportunity of showing his stack of newspaper articlesthat 
had appeared since Jim was arrested and read off their head¬ 
ings. The court was kept busy for a long time ruling on 
objections for as fast as one objectionable line of evidence 
was ruled out another appeared. After hours of heated 
oratory and counter oratory that kept the roomful of audi¬ 
tors on tiptoe all the time Runyon grasped the fateful letter 
from the clerks’ desk and holding it aloft thundered: “Did 
you write this letter, Mr. Albright?” 

“I did not.” 

“Did you cause it to be written?” 

“I did not.” 

“ Did you know of its being written ?” 

“I did not.” 

“Did you mail it or know of its being mailed?” 

“I did not. I never heard of such a letter till after I was 
arrested.” 

“Did you ever write or speak publicly libelously or any 
other way of the ladies at this ball?” 

“I never did.” 

“Take the witness,” said Runyon, and he sat down. All 
had been done that could be done. 

“Mr. Albright,” said the prosecutor, “are you running 
on the prohibitionist ticket for sheriff and are you bitterly op¬ 
posed to liquor in any form ?” 


336 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

“I am such a candidate and am in favor of strictly enforcing 
all the laws of county, state, and nation, including the liquor 
laws.” 

“And you were investigating the liquor business in this city 
on the night of this society ball when you looked in on the 
gathering where the ladies were who are maligned in this 
letter ?” 

“I was investigating the liquor business on that night.” 

“Is this your typewriter?” 

“It is.” 

“You kept it in your home on a stand next to your desk?” 

“Yes.” 

“And the typewriter was locked in its case?” 

“Yes.” 

“Is this the same letter paper that you,as a church official, 
have been using for church notices ?” 

“It is.” 

“And you kept this letter paper in your desk beside the 
typewriter ?” 

“I kept paper that was exactly similar to that in my desk.” 

“And the desk was locked ?” 

“It was.” 

“Who have had keys to that typewriter lock and that desk 
lock since July seventh ?” 

“Myself and my father.” 

“Has anyone else a key to either?” 

“Not that I know of.” 

“Were you at home the night of July eighth?” 

“Yes.” 

“Did you write some letters on that typewriter that night 
or the next morning and mail them at Cardon on the morn¬ 
ing of July ninth?” 

“I did.” 

“That’s all,” and the prosecutor sat down. 

“The defence rests,” said Runyon. The case was up to 
the jury. 

The Judge arranged some papers before him on which he 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 337 

had been working making notes preparatory to giving his 
instructions to the jury after which the attorneys on either side 
would make their addresses. He had just commenced to 
speak amid the profoundest silence. “ Gentlemen of the 
jury, I will now instruct you,” when he and everyone else in 
the room were startled by a feminine voice that broke in: 
“I wrote the letter; I wrote the letter, and I come to tell about 
it. Big Jim didn’t write it at all.” 

Everyone in the room looked to see who it was who dared 
interrupt the almost sacred silence. They saw a young girl, 
not over eighteen, what might be called a beautiful girl, 
reddish auburn hair, masses of it, brilliant hazel eyes, the 
illuminated hazel that is only rarely seen outside North Ire¬ 
land or similar climatic districts; a flushed face with regular, 
perfect, womanly features, dressed stylishly, almost sportily, 
holding her hat in her hands which were clenched across the 
railing as she leaned forward on the outside a short distance 
from the lawyers’ table and looked over the head of the 
sheriff straight at the Judge. There was a mingled look of 
distress and eagerness on her face. She had come in just as 
the Judge commenced his address. The bailiff guarding the 
door along with all the rest of the listeners was paying atten¬ 
tion to the beginning of the Judge’s instructions and the girl 
had walked past him unnoticed. No one had seen her till 
she spoke. 

There was an instant of surprised silence, withno sound ;only 
the gaze of hundreds of questioning eyes on the girl appari¬ 
tion. Then the bailiffs and the sheriff awoke to their duty. 
It was their business to keep order in the room. But they 
stopped as the Judge sensed some new development and said: 
“Mr. Prosecutor, will you have the young lady come inside 
so we can find out what it is she wishes to say?” 

The sheriff motioned to the girl to come around inside the 
railing. She did so, the flush deepening on her face. The 
prosecutor met her as she entered the little gateway and 
Attorney Runyon arose and gave her his chair at the front 
of the table facing the Judge; he leaning on the corner of the 


338 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

clerks’ table a few feet away. The Judge leaned a little for¬ 
ward and so did everyone else in the court room. Those in 
the rear of the room who couldn’t see well rose silently to their 
feet. 

“What was it you wished to say in this case ? Do you know 
anything about the writing of this letter?” asked the Judge. 

“Yes, I wrote it. No, I mean I copied it. Red Barth 
wrote it. I mean he had it all written and I copied it on Big 
Jim’s machine. I didn’t know anything about Big Jim being 
blamed for it till just a few minutes ago. I read it in a news¬ 
paper that he was on trial for it and I found out where the 
trial was and I just flew up here to tell you. I’m not too late, 
am I? Big Jim isn’t to blame. I’m the one and Red Barth 
and I’ll do anything in the world to make it right. I’m not 
too late, am I ? I never knew anything about it or I’d have 
come before. You see I’ve been dopey of late and wasn’t 
just myself but I’m all right now.” 

The sensation in the room was electric and universal. The 
eager, truthful earnestness of the girl, her intelligent and pre¬ 
possessing appearance and her already apparently first-hand 
knowledge of absolutely fundamental facts in the case on 
hand turned the audience into a curiosity spell-bound throng; 
hundreds of eyes focused on the one individual, hundreds of 
faces showing interest only in one thing in the world, the 
face and figure and voice and future revelations of that girl. 
The Judge looked down on her now with a keen, discerning, 
kindly glance. He believed the key had been found to the 
puzzling legal and judicial complexity that had worried him 
for forty-eight hours. The jurors sat up in their chairs and 
looked straight at the girl. They, too, formed swift impres¬ 
sions of what it really meant and their faces showed that if it 
were so, if their surmises were correct, what a relief it would 
be to them. The prosecutor stood half hesitating, halting, 
as it were, reading the doom of all his finished efforts and great 
fight, dreading lest the words he heard and was about to hear 
would bring the structure he had helped to build so carefully 
down in ruins as if a hurricane leveled it. 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 339 

Runyon half sat on the corner of the table near the girl. 
He was ready to act. He, too, sensed the situation and his 
coming triumph. It looked to him as if the clock had struck 
the hour for victory. Jim had turned and looked at Mary as 
the girl first spoke. Their eyes said, “all’s well,” and Mary 
leaned forward and displayed the most intense interest while 
Jim settled back in his seat, seemingly content to wait. 

The four rows of society women had their wish for a new 
sensation clearly gratified. All the way through the trial it 
had been one new act after another on this human stage such 
as they had never seen before. The tragedy was about to 
close with its finale and here sprang up an entirely different 
final act; curtains all drawn; footlights blazing; the actress 
on the stage in a soul-satisfying, emotional scene. It was ail 
magnificent. And if Big Jim wasn’t the degraded villain of a 
bitter tragedy at the end as the advertising had shown he 
would be, why, it was all a play anyway and the experience 
furnished the thrills and the thrills were the thing. The rest 
of the audience in front and rear leaned forward and looked 
with all its eyes and listened with all its ears. Delker’s face 
was a complex study. 

“I move that the case be reopened to allow this young lady 
to appear as a witness for the defence,” said Attorney 
Runyon so quietly that if it had not been for the completest 
of silences even the Judge might not have heard him but 
which was now heard and comprehended in the farthest 
corner of the room as if he had shouted the words. “If 
there’s no objection that wilt be the order,” said the court. 

“No objection!” said the prosecutor. 

“You will please sit here,” said Runyon, motioning to the 
witness chair. “We want to ask you a few questions and be¬ 
fore we do that you will hold up your right hand and take the 
usual witness oath.” The girl advanced and held up her hand 
as the attorney had told her to do in imitation of the clerk 
who had raised his hand. He began to repeat the oath. 
Evidently she had never been in a court room before and 
had not seen or heard anything of the kind in her past life for 


340 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

she repeated the oath word for word after him. Usually 
such an occurrence would have caused considerable hilarity 
but not a smile was visible in the entire room. Her action 
stamped the girl as a hundred per cent, truthful in anything 
she might say in the mind of every spectator. She was as 
honest as any human being could be and would tell the exact 
truth whatever that truth might be. 

“Now first thing we want to know your name?” queried 
Attorney Runyon. 

“Louise Eventrate. I’m a stenographer. I work for the 
Big Standard Lumber Company, that is when I work,” she 
said in a hesitating way. “I know Big Jim; that is, I did 
know him when I was a school girl. We lived out his way 
and he and his folks were awful good to us; I mean to Benny 
and me. Benny is my little brother. We lived out on the 
farm beyond Albright. Papa died out there when I was ten 
years old and Benny was five. Big Jim was there when he 
died and they did everything they could. There was only 
mama and me and Benny and they helped us plough the 
land and work the farm and advised us what was best to do. 
Judge Albright and Big Jim would come and help work with¬ 
out being asked and wouldn’t take pay for it and Mary 
would come with Big Jim most of the time and stay with 
mama and help her in the house and be company for her. 
I went to school and so did Mary but she was older than I 
was and farther along in school. Then mama died and 
Benny and me were left alone in the world.” Here the girl 
broke down and cried for a few minutes. The Judge sat 
back in his chair and waited till she recovered. Attorney 
Runyon busied himself arranging some papers as an excuse 
for waiting. Jim sat and looked straight ahead. Mary’s 
eyes had grown dim with tears and some of the other women 
were clearing the gathered mists from their vision. The 
homeless girl had unconsciously appealed to the hearts of the 
entire assemblage and a great wave of sympathetic feeling, 
truly genuine and in some cases unrestrained, swept over the 
room. 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 341 

The girl herself was not aware that it was so or the how or 
why of this telepathic transmission of sympathy and neither 
did anyone else in the crowded room but there it was; a 
universal emotion in the narrow environs of the court-room 
walls; one of those accepted elemental and humanly unknow¬ 
able facts that surround and compose the daily life of men 
and women. She had reached one of the common chords of 
the millennial civilization, of the future perfect world that 
dreamers dream of in their daydreams, in the soul of the 
judge and the lawyer and the merchant and the farmer and 
the bootblack and the women in the front seats, and there 
was unison everywhere in the vibration. They all under¬ 
stood the voiceless message that came to each on instantane¬ 
ous wings through the unseeable aura of the unknowable 
universe around them. 

She recovered her composure and resumed her story. The 
Judge and attorneys allowed her to talk on. She evidently 
thought that she had to tell her story; that they had seated 
her there for that purpose and besides she had come there to 
do that very thing. “When mama died Mary and her mother 
and Mrs. Albright were with us all the time and Benny and 
me lived at Judge Albright’s for a while. Then we went to 
school in the city and I studied shorthand and typewriting. 
I used to see Big Jim and Mary frequently and Mr. and Mrs. 
Morton and Judge and Mrs. Albright till the last three years. 
I went to San Francisco to work and since then I haven’t 
seen any of them. I got into bad company in San Francisco. 
It was war times and I guess we young girls are flighty any¬ 
way. At any rate, the war prosperity was too much for most 
of us who were not living at our own home. We usually 
began by drinking a little wine or beer; not much but too 
much. It doesn’t take much to be too much for us. Then 
we added a little whiskey or brandy; not much but too much 
for us. And we added cigarettes, of course. They go with 
the liquor; the two are linked together. Where you find one 
among us girls you can look for the other. We were follow¬ 
ing the fashion. All the fashionable women were smoking 


342 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

and we imitated them as we always do. They were imi¬ 
tating Paris and we were imitating them. I guess they 
copied all the bad habits that Paris had and we copied their 
bad habits and added them to our own bad habits. We 
girls were dressing and drinking and smoking as much like 
the higher society ladies, or what we thought were the higher 
society ladies, as we could. We had money to throw away in 
those war days. They rouged and powdered and drank and 
gambled and smoked as much like the painted Parisiennes as 
they could and we rouged and powdered and drunk and 
gambled and smoked like parrots, following their example; 
so we were all daubed with the same brush. 

“ Drinking grew tame and smoking common so we took to 
dope; not much at first; just enough to make us sick. Smok¬ 
ing and drinking and doping are all alike in one way; they 
all make the beginner sick. They make you so sick and are 
so distasteful that you have to persist to form the habit. 
I guess good habits don’t make you sick while you’re form¬ 
ing them. We persisted enough to get the dope habit. We 
thought we could break away when we wanted to but I’ve had 
the habit so long now that I can’t break away. No use try¬ 
ing. It’s got me fast and I’m a prisoner and I’ve got shackles 
on and they’re there to stay. Wine, whiskey, and dope; 
every girl that gets dopey begins on wine and whiskey. No 
wine and whiskey and there’s no dope for the girl out alone 
in the world. I know that for I’ve seen it. 

“I’m reckless now for I know I’m gone as far as myself is 
concerned. I’ve walked the floor for night after night trying 
to break myself of it. I’ve dug my finger nails into the palms 
of my hands till I drew blood in my agony. The sweat has 
run off my face in a cold, fireless room on winter nights. 
I’ve trembled like a leaf for days and nights; no eating, no rest, 
no sleep. My brain has boiled in my head till every throb of 
an artery sounded like a cannon ten feet away. My mental 
and physical torture! Why, there’s no language to describe 
it. I’ve gone away into the mountains and lived for weeks 
where there was no dope to be had and fought it like a maniac 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 343 

out in the lonely hills; and I was a maniac each time I tried 
that way of cure for days and weeks at a time. I’ve tried to 
taper off and quit by degrees and failed each time in the most 
disheartening way. Fve prayed to God to help me and 
cursed God for bringing me into the world. I’m a hopeless 
dope fiend through wine and whiskey. I couldn’t stand 
them; no woman can; our nerves explode; we degenerate as 
women; they aggravate every bad impulse in us and kill 
every good impulse. I was dopey the night I wrote that 
letter.” 

The girl’s talk was hypnotizing. She had naturally a 
splendid, womanly voice, pitched low and full toned like the 
best voices of refined English women. She had started on 
this confession in an impromptu and evidently truthful 
manner; had been hurried along in it by the trend of the cir¬ 
cumstances and had rattled on because there was no stopping 
place and because she thought it was necessary to explain the 
original facts as to why she wrote the letter about her friend, 
Big Jim. It was necessary for her to give a reason for her 
action and the reason called for the baring of her past life; 
the revealment of inner facts that she would otherwise have 
recoiled from giving to the world. She did this so earnestly 
and with such emphasis, though she never spoke a loud word, 
that the listeners were enthralled. 

“Go ahead,” said Runyon, as she paused. “Tell us 
about your writing the letter. Was this the letter you 
wrote?” and he handed her the letter introduced in evidence 
by the prosecutor. 

“Yes, that’s it. I wrote that letter on Big Jim’s machine 
in his house a month or so ago. I know the paper; it’s creamy 
stuff, not like common paper. It was about these society 
ball people and I made a copy of it.” 

“Tell us how you came to write this letter?” 

“Well, I was dopey up in the Rookery lodging house and 
Red Barth came in and wakened me up. He wanted some 
typing work done so Red and Ferrett and me were driven 
out in the country by a taxi driver. I didn’t know where we 


344 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

were going and I didn’t care. We got to a cross roads and 
the taxi driver ran the machine in behind some trees and 
Red and Ferrett and myself got out and went to a house 
near by. I don’t know what time it was but it was awful 
dark. We stumbled up to the back door of the house. I 
didn’t know whose house it was. Red had his flashlight and 
he threw it on the keyhole in the door and Ferrett got a key 
from his bunch of keys and unlocked the door. You see 
Ferrett can unlock any door. He’s got a thousand different 
kinds of keys, I guess. I suppose that’s his business; unlocking 
doors and other locks. 

“Then we stumbled in and went to a room where there was 
a desk and a typewriter with a tin cover which was locked 
down. Ferrett unlocked both the desk and the typewriter 
as Red held his flashlight on the locks. Red got this paper 
out of a small compartment in the desk which was marked 
‘Church Notices’ and got a carbon sheet and held his flashlight 
on a letter which he had with him right before me. It was 
written with a lead pencil and was his handwriting. I copied 
it and it’s this letter. We didn’t address the letter when I 
copied it. I addressed the original to the ‘Editor of the 
Daily Clarion ’ on the machine and then put a piece of paper 
over the carbon copy and addressed it to the ‘Editor of 
Current Topics ’ so that the address on that letter shows as a 
carbon copy. Then we addressed two envelopes to the two 
newspapers on the machine; Red holding his flashlight so I 
could see. The letter was signed ‘Mij.’ Yes, those are the 
envelopes we used. They are peculiar envelopes. Then just 
as we finished there was a noise in the front yard as if someone 
had arrived at the house and Red grabbed the letters and the 
blank paper I had used to make the original address for the 
Current Topics on and I had the carbons in my hand and I 
crumpled them up and put them in my pocket and Ferrett 
locked the desk and typewriter again and we flew for the door. 
The noise continued in the front yard and Red opened the 
door very cautiously and saw nothing in the back yard so 
we flew back to the auto as fast as we could and we beat 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 


345 


it back to town. The driver had put out his lights some 
distance from the cross roads when we went out and he 
didn’t turn them on till we got back quite a distance toward 
town. 

“I didn’t know it was Big Jim’s house and Red told me 
nothing. I didn’t know my writing had caused anybody any 
trouble till this afternoon. I’ve been pretty dopey of late and 
didn’t pay much attention to what was going on in the world. 
I am all right to-day and was reading the newspapers and 
read about this trial as it’s the biggest sensation in the papers 
I saw. When I saw Big Jim’s name I was more interested 
and got all the papers for a week back and found out it was 
all about this letter and it came to me that it was the letter I 
wrote that caused all the trouble and no wonder Big Jim 
denied he knew anything about it. It’s my letter and not his 
and I came out here as quick as I could run to tell you about 
it; all the truth that I know.” 

“And who is Red Barth?” 

“Oh, he’s Lew Delker’s right-hand man in the Bowery. He 
rounds our crowd all up when anything is needed.” 

“Where can he be found?” 

“Almost anywhere round town, probably at the Rookery 
lodging house; perhaps at Delker’s office.” 

“And where can this other man, Ferrett, be found?” 

“He’s at the Rookery. He has a room there.” 

“And the taxi driver?” 

“That’s A 1 Hooger. He’s at work on his cab. He was 
down in the yard here when I came in.” 

“I’ll issue a bench warrant for these parties at once. Mr. 
Sheriff, bring them in immediately. Take as many deputies 
as you need to round them up quickly. I’ll give you search 
warrants for their rooms,” said the Judge. 

“We’re through with the witness for the present,” said 
Runyon. 

“Have you anything to corroborate your strange story?” 
asked the prosecutor. 

“No I just know it happened that way.” 


346 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

“And you are very friendly to James Albright ?” 

“Oh, yes, they were just like my own family to me. I 
would do anything for them. I haven’t seen any of them 
though for three years.” 

“Do you remember what was done with the letters after 
you wrote them?” 

“We were in great hurry on account of the noise in the 
yard. Red took the letters and envelopes with him and I 
remember we all looked around to see that nothing was left 
and I had the carbon sheets in my hand and I put them in 
my pocket. I guess they’re there yet in my cloak.” 

“That’s all,” said the prosecutor. 

“Where is the cloak that you speak of as having the carbon 
sheets in its pocket?” asked Runyon. 

“Hanging up in room two-thirty-nine, Rookery Building, 
on the hook on the back of the door.” 

“I suggest that a bailiff go with the witness and bring the 
cloak here, your Honor.” 

“So ordered,” said the Judge. 

In ten minutes the cloak was produced in court by the 
bailiff. “I’ve had it in my charge all the time since it was 
taken off the hook,” explained the bailiff. The girl drew 
from the pocket two crumpled carbon sheets. The attorneys 
opened them, looked at them, and handed them to the Judge. 
He looked at them. “It is corroboration,” said Runyon. 
“I offer these sheets in evidence and request that they be 
labeled defendant’s exhibit number one.” 

“If there’s no objection it will be so ordered,” said the 
court. Runyon passed the carbon sheets and the letter to the 
jury who amused themselves looking them over while they 
waited. 

In a few minutes a deputy came in with A 1 Hooger. “ I wish 
to speak to this young man,” said Runyon. The Judge 
nodded. After a moment’s conversation with him he said: 
“We will call Mr. Hooger as a witness for the defence.” 
Hooger took the witness stand. “Mr. Hooger, what is your 
business ?” 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 


347 


“Bus driver.” 

“Did you drive Red Barth, a man by the name of Ferrett, 
and Miss Eventrate out in the country about a month ago 
after dark?” 

“Yes.” 

“Where did you go?” 

“Out to Big Jim Albright’s.” 

“Who hired you?” 

“Red Barth.” 

“What did the party go there for?” 

“I don’t know. Red told me where to drive and I drove 
where he said. When I got to the cross roads at Big Jim’s 
he told me to drive in behind the hedge. The party got out 
there and went to the house. I don’t know what for. In a 
few minutes they came back in a great hurry and got in the 
auto and we came to town.” 

“Do you know the date?” 

“No, I don’t remember the exact date.” 

“That’s all.” 

“No questions,” said the prosecutor. “I suggest,” he 
continued, “that this hearing be adjourned to a later hour 
which will give the sheriff time to bring in the other parties.” 

“We will not adjourn the hearing now,” said the Judge. 
“The defendant in this case seems to be entitled to a verdict 
of acquittal; a complete exoneration. If the other parties 
are not produced in five minutes more I’ll entertain such a 
motion on the evidence already in.” 

At that moment the sheriff appeared with Red Barth., 
handcuffed, and led him inside the railing. “We found the 
other fellow, Ferrett, locked up in his room. He wouldn’t 
open it and when we broke down the door he slid out the 
window and disappeared in a second. He’s the slipperiest 
little individual I ever had anything to do with. The dep¬ 
uties are trying to find him now. I found bunches of keys 
in the room scattered all around and a dope outfit and an all¬ 
round sneak thief’s paraphernalia. We have a guard on the 
room. Red tried to escape so we handcuffed him. I found 


348 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

this in his room.” He handed the Judge a paper. The 
Judge looked it over and passed it to Runyon. 

“We will call Red Barth as a witness,” said Runyon. 

“I presume he should be informed of his legal rights: that 
he is not compelled to incriminate himself,” said the prosecu¬ 
tor. 

“We’re not presuming that he needs any such warning,” 
said Runyon tartly. “We’re calling him as we would any 
other citizen; if he’s a criminal it will appear later.” 

“Take off the handcuffs; let him be sworn,” said the 
court. Red was a pitiable looking object as he stood there. 
His red hair, from which he got his name, stuck out in un¬ 
combed bunches from his big head. His eyes were in¬ 
flamed and half closed and his face the color of bright red 
brick. His features were swollen, his clothes hung on him 
loose and unkempt, his knees were wobbly. He looked like 
dissipation’s wreck. He was evidently frightened and every 
little while a tremor, which he tried to control, but couldn’t, 
shook his body. The handcuffs were taken off and he sat 
down in the witness chair. 

“What is your name?” asked Runyon. 

“Red Barth.” 

“Is it not a fact that about a month ago you and Ferrett 
and Miss Eventrate were driven by A 1 Hooger out to Big 
Jim Albright’s after night?” 

The witness hesitated. He was trying to get his brain to 
size up this highly dangerous situation. How much did 
they know? There was Louise and A 1 Hooger sitting there 
looking right at him. Evidently they had told all. He 
was in a hole and couldn’t lie out of it. He might as well con¬ 
fess to some of it, anyway. “Yes,” he said, “we went out 
there.” 

“And you and Ferrett and Miss Eventrate went to the 
house and you held the flashlight on the lock and Ferrett 
unlocked the door and you went in, didn’t you?” 

The witness again hesitated and drops of sweat came out 
on his forehead. The question came to him: Was his part in 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 349 

opening that door burglary? If it was he could see the peni¬ 
tentiary right before him. No, it couldn’t be burglary for 
him, anyway, for it was Ferrett who opened the door. “Yes, 
we went in,” he said. 

“And you went to Big Jim’s desk and typewriter, which 
were both locked, and Ferrett unlocked them while you held 
your flashlight on the locks?” The sweat now formed in 
drops and ran down his cheeks. They knew it all. He 
looked around as a rat caught in a trap might look at his 
captors. There was Louise looking intently at him with a 
frank gaze of pity but also her look said: “I have told every¬ 
thing now it’s up to you. Better come through, they’ve got 
us.” There was A 1 Hooger. His look also said: “You’re 
caught, better come through.” There were the relentless 
attorneys looking straight through him. They knew it all 
and were stabbing him with this question and had another 
ready to stab him with and then another. The prosecutor 
was silently and resignedly looking at him as much as to say: 
“I can’t help you; not even a little bit; it’s all up to you.” 
There was Big Jim looking at him and waiting; and the Judge 
just to his left; and the jury just to his right; and a big bunch 
of very interested women out yonder; and a roomful of men; 
all looking through him and reading his thoughts and this 
awful question thundering in his ears. “Is that true?” 
queried the lawyer again as Red remained silent. 

“Yes, it’s true.” 

“And you took these two sheets of paper from the desk and 
put in this very carbon sheet between them and then held a 
letter you had written with a lead pencil under your flashlight 
before Miss Eventrate while she copied it and made this 
letter and this copy?” 

It was all up; they had the goods on him. “Yes,” he said. 

“And this is the letter you wrote yourself with a lead pen¬ 
cil and had Miss Eventrate run ofF?” asked Runyon, hand¬ 
ing him the paper the sheriff had found in Red’s room. 

“Yes, it is,” said Red resignedly, surrendering completely. 

“And you’ve had it in your room since that night?” 


350 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 


“Yes.” 

“I present this in evidence and request it to be marked 
defendant’s exhibit number two,” said Runyon, handing it 
to the prosecutor. 

“So ordered,” said the Judge. 

“And you put these letters that Miss Eventrate wrote in 
these envelopes and mailed them to the two newspapers 
the next morning at Cardon post office?” 

“Yes.” 

“Now, Mr. Barth, why was all this procedure gone through 
with? Tell this court and jury why you did all this.” 

“We had to beat Big Jim. He was running like a scared 
wolf and we had to check his stampede some way. We 
thought if we could get the women all mad and raise a hulla¬ 
baloo and get him charged with the rumpus it would put 
him out so I got this letter written on his machine so as to 
show it was him did it.” 

“And who is ‘we’? Who are the other fellows who helped 
you out in this plot? Who was it put you up to it?” 

“Why, we talked it over some in Lew Delker’s.” 

“And who first outlined the plot?” 

“I got it from Lew Delker. I don’t know that there was 
any outlining; it just flashed on my mind from a suggestion 
made by Lew. I guess I’m to blame for it.” 

“Did Lew Delker suggest it to you?” 

“Well, it was from a suggestion he made that I got the 
idea.” 

“Who was present at the time?” 

“No one, if I remember right. But I’m the fellow who is 
to blame. They didn’t do anything. Lew just gave the 
idea.” 

“Have you talked about how you carried out this plot with 
Lew Delker or anyone since that night?” 

“No, it wasn’t a subject to talk about. I guess everybody 
understood.” 

“That’s all,” said Runyon. 

“No questions,” said the prosecutor. 


35i 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

“We now renew our motion for a directed verdict of ac¬ 
quittal,said Runyon. 

“No objection,” said the prosecutor. “The motion is 
granted,” said the court. “Gentlemen of the jury, you are 
directed by the court to bring in a verdict of not guilty in this 
case. You will elect a foreman and the clerk will submit the 
blank form to be filled out and signed by your foreman.” 
The jury elected the foreman and the verdict was handed to 
the clerk who handed it to the Judge. 

“The jury has returned a verdict of acquittal in this case,” 
said the court. “Mr. James Albright, you are completely 
exonerated. The charge against you has been proved to be 
false. You go from this court room not only a free man but a 
completely vindicated citizen who has been subjected to 
ignominy, calumny, and persecution by political conspira¬ 
tors who seem to be unscrupulous. Mr. Prosecutor, you will 
look into this case of conspiracy against Mr. Albright and file 
the proper charges based on this testimony to-day and what¬ 
ever new facts you may learn. Mr. Sheriff, you will detain Red 
Barth and Lew Delker until the prosecutor has time to make 
out the charge in their case. You will also provide Miss Even- 
trate with a room in the county building here downstairs. 
She is held as a witness till the prosecutor is through with his 
investigation. She will not be a prisoner but will be under the 
care of the jailer’s wife and will be free to come and go. A 1 
Hooger will also report to the prosecutor at the close of this 
case. I do not think it necessary to detain him. We will 
adjourn court till to-morrow at nine o’clock.” 

The court room instantly became a bedlam. The crowd 
surged around Jim to congratulate him. The sheriff gave 
Red Barth into the custody of one of his deputies and tried to 
get back to where Lew Delker was to detain him but he 
couldn’t make his way through the jam. The Judge left 
the bench and came down to shake hands with Jim and it 
seemed as if every man and woman in the room wanted to do 
the same thing. Men were laughing and jabbering to each 
other in loud tones. A big crowd in the back of the room 


352 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

who couldn’t get to the front stood on the chairs and cheered 
and whooped. Women were laughing and crying at the 
same time. Mary clung to Jim’s arm; both tears and smiles 
were on her face. The rest of Jim’s family were enjoying 
the happy tumult. The crowds outside the doors in the 
corridors of the court house and in the yard, who were waiting 
to hear a verdict of guilty, heard instead the amazing story of 
the finale and they also went wild. Jim’s friends and his 
star were in the ascendancy. The crowd was all Big Jim 
now. The only calm man in all the hubbub was Big Jim. 
He accepted the congratulations poured on him in such pro¬ 
fusion courteously but without any of the exuberant feeling 
that might have been expected. He had kept his head 
during the trial and it was level now. He knew well how 
much and how little popular acclaim is really worth. The 
loss of it hadn’t unsettled his natural equilibrium during 
the fierce bombardment of the last month and the regaining 
of it didn’t unsettle his equilibrium now. 

His journey out of the building and down town was a 
triumphal procession. Behind the gesticulating, loud-toned, 
loud-laughing, loud-cheering, almost hysterical crowd of 
men and women came the sheriff and his deputies with Red 
Barth and Delker, in custody, destined for the jail in the 
basement until their bonds could be arranged. Red was a 
trembling wreck. Delker was raging but helpless. He had 
built a castle of calumny with infinite care and labor and had 
it completed. The sun was shining and the towers were all 
lighted up by the brilliance; a gorgeous piece of architecture. 
Suddenly a typhoon splintered it; rent it apart; wrecked it; 
and it fell on him. He was under the ruins. He knew no 
help would come to him through his neighbors although they 
knew he was there; pinned down. He would have to 
struggle out as best he could. The cheers that rang outside, 
and now were heard far down the street, were for Big Jim Al¬ 
bright and the crowd that cheered had forgotten Delker. He 
was a deserted crook under the ruins of his castle of calumny. 

The news flew over the city and out in the country and the 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 353 

country people began to pour in to learn the details. The 
evening papers came out with extended news reports, al¬ 
though some of them were shaded as much as possible. On 
the front page of several was a notice. It called a public 
meeting in front of the city hall that night at eight o’clock to 
form a Big Jim Albright campaign club. It was signed by 
Caledon, Reyland, and Smith. 

Jim went to the hotel, escorted by his friends. He re¬ 
fused to make any speech when called on. He had supper 
with the family group and Montague and the friends from 
the farms in the country around and Reverend and Mrs. 
Story. It was a jubilee party. When they were alone, the 
same party that had been there in that very parlor the night 
Jim was arrested, he said: “Friends, let us thank God for the 
blessings of to-day and all the days. I have a lot of faith in 
man but I’ve more faith in God. When we knelt down here 
to worship Him three weeks ago clouds and darkness were 
round about us and the forecast was somber. This evening 
no cloud is in the sky, the sun is shining, and the horizon 
foretells a perfect day to-morrow. I have found out by 
experience that the power of reverent faith is the greatest com¬ 
forter and the strongest support that man can have either in 
the day of success or the night of adversity. I’ve lived on 
faith in God for a month. The man who attains perfect 
reverent faith in Him may be envied by kings. I ask Rever¬ 
end Story to lead us again in prayer in this room.” 

Caledon, Reyland, and Smith looked out over a sea of faces 
at eight o’clock in front of the city hall when they called the 
meeting to order to form a Big Jim Albright campaign club. 
Caledon opened the meeting. “ We three were the committee 
that caused Big Jim to be haled before the superior court as 
a criminal. We want to make what amends we can. We 
want to practically demonstrate our satisfaction at his 
vindication and our detestation of the detestable conspiracy 
to wreck his campaign and perhaps wreck the life of an 
honorable and trustworthy citizen. We want to lead in form¬ 
ing a Big Jim Albright campaign club in this city and the 


354 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

same kind of a club in every precinct; devoted alone to the 
campaign interests of Big Jim Albright. We want to see 
these clubs so strong in membership that Big Jim’s nomina¬ 
tion and election will be practically unanimous.” 

The suggestion was welcomed with a mighty and long- 
continued cheer. A club was organized at once with Caledon 
as president. Delegations were appointed to go out and or¬ 
ganize other clubs all over the county. Jim was called for 
and he and Mary and the family group were fairly dragged 
from the hotel before the army of voters. “ Speech! Speech !” 
came from all sides, from near and far away. 

“My friends,” said Jim, “I am a candidate for sheriff. 
I’ve only one line in my sheriff’s platform. ‘Enforce the 
law of the land without fear and without favor.’ Any 
citizen who wants all the laws of the land enforced can vote 
for me for that I’ll do with all my might, with all my heart 
and soul. If you form a club for me I request that you print 
on your banners: ‘Enforce all the laws.’ That epitomizes 
my views. It will be painted over my door as sheriff. It 
will express my policy. If you vote for me you vote for that; 
nothing more and nothing less: ‘Enforce all the laws.”’ Jim 
had a powerful voice and it reached far up and down the 
street so that all could hear. He stepped down off the plat¬ 
form and the windows in the buildings shook with the cheer 
that went up. The people, the real people, were with him. 

“I can say to Mr. Albright,” said President Caledon, “that 
he can go home and attend to his farm work. He needn’t 
come out in this campaign any more. We’ll attend to his 
nomination and his election. I give him notice now that he 
can make all his arrangements to move into the sheriff’s 
office January first.” This brought another storm of ap¬ 
plause and the meeting had a whirlwind ending with fifty 
membership lists being signed up. 

“Say, Jim, I’m awful glad to be home after all this trouble, 
trouble, trouble, of the last month. It seems a year instead 
of a month. You’re not going out again, are you?” They 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 355 

were sitting on a settee before their own fireplace where the 
dry wood crackled and blazed and threw a bright, cheerful 
light across the big room. It was home, sweet home, with 
all the surroundings that made the perfect home for 
Mary. 

“No, we won’t go out any more. I’m going to leave it to 
the clubs. I’ve got advertising enough by this time so that 
I couldn’t add anything to that part of it and everyone in 
the country knows what I stand for now so I’ll just leave well 
enough alone; besides, I’m tired.” 

“That’s good. I don’t believe working politics is a wo¬ 
man’s work anyway. I believe from my experience there’s 
something awry in the life of any woman that wants to get out 
in politics to make a business of it. She’s either a failure in 
her home or her home is a failure. The homeless woman 
may take up something of the kind because she must have 
something to divert her mind with but not me. I’ve a home 
and I just want to stay there and live in the home world. 
The whirligig of politics and public life is another world 
altogether and I’m going to leave it to you men. I’m through. 
I’ve seen your political whirlpool and breathed the political 
atmosphere and I’m done; all done; I’ve quit for good.” 

“Well, we rough men will go ahead and fight and maul and 
tear about and make a mix and a muss of it as usual. You 
know the theory is that you women were going to convert the 
political broils into drawing-room affairs by diluting our 
rough-neck methods with the refining influences of good, pure 
womanhood. Judging from our last month’s experiences the 
dilution wasn’t sufficiently diluted. At least the refining and 
ennobling influence of good, semi-angelic womanhood isn’t 
very much in evidence in the field of practical politics.” 

“No, and it never will be, Jim. I’ve seen enough of it to 
know that. You see we’re different makeups and women will 
never take men’s places in the political world and be successes. 
Now take my case. I want a home above everything else, 
with a great, big, strong, handsome, darling husband just like 
you to love and love me and sometimes I want, as I heard 


356 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

Doctor Partridge express it when he was bringing Clara back 
to life after the laudanum adventure, three splendid boys and 
three nice girls, all my own to look after. I want them to 
cuddle up to me when babies and put their little arms around 
my neck and love me and trust me in their childish way while 
I love them in my motherly way. 

“I want my girls to be the nicest, sweetest, brightest, 
modestest, most intelligent, most affectionate, real Christian 
girls in the world all the time that they’re growing up; I 
want them to keep house with me and we’ll be chums and 
playmates and pals in the kitchen and parlor and school work 
and church work; all the time my own girls; their life my 
life and my life their life. And I want my three boys to be 
very intelligent in boyish things and honest and manly and 
affectionate and willing to take their own or their sisters’part 
in life’s troubles; not sissies in any respect themselves; real 
Christians and not ashamed to own it in public and to live it; 
living by the Golden Rule; always willing to do something 
for me or the girls and always wanting to look after us; in¬ 
heriting the very best qualities of their respected papa, 
that’s you, taking the leader’s parts in the best boys’ games 
and outdoor sports while they’re growing up and the leader’s 
part in men’s affairs in the world of business and professional 
life and government and politics and religion when they grow 

up ;” 

“Well, is there anything else?” asked Jim as he laughed 
at her monologue. 

“Yes, there’s a whole lot more. I want the boys and their 
papa, that’s you, to provide the home for all of us; that’s a 
man’s work. And I want the boys and their papa to go out 
and clear the land and dig up the stumps and raise the cattle 
and horses and sheep and hogs and do the heavy work in the 
fields and around the house and provide a good living for the 
girls and me so that we have all the comforts of life in our 
own home; and I want the boys and their papa, that’s you, to 
make the laws and enforce them and provide money for the 
school and the church and the roads and to take care of the 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 357 

unfortunates; the blind and the cripples and the criminals 
and do everything that is to be done for the state and the 
nation. You make the tariff laws and the bank and money 
laws and the railroad and steamship laws and regulations 
and look after all the big things in government. That’s a 
man’s work just like clearing the land of stumps or driving 
a truck or keeping it in shape or building a silo or raising 
stock or digging ditches or providing a home; and the girls 
and me don’t want to have anything to do with a man’s 
work.” 

“I’m beginning to understand,” said Jim amusedly. “Go 
right ahead.” 

“All right, I’ll continue my Utopian talk. The girls and me 
want to begin where the boys and their papa, that’s you, leave 
off. We want to take the home after it’s provided. Then 
it’s ours and we want to feminize it. No bachelors’ shack for 
us. We want the family life; the life with family love and 
family affection in it. That’s all we, the girls and me, live 
for. That’s what makes our home complete. The big, 
roomy, finely furnished mansion is a wonderful help but if it 
didn’t have family love and affection in it we, the girls and me, 
would fly from it any old time to the little four-room, weather¬ 
beaten, boarded-up shell of a house where there was family 
love and affection. 

“We, the girls and me, live on love and affection. We 
must have someone to love and care for or we don’t live our 
natural lives. We want a great, big, strong, handsome or 
homely, manly, honest-to-goodness fellow that we can look 
up to and worship and boss around while we worship; but if 
he doesn’t come our way then we take the next best or the 
next best to that or still the next best till we get down to going 
round with poodle dogs or Persian cats or Pekinese dogs or 
any old thing in our arms. One of us hugging a poodle dog or 
a Persian cat is just a case of perverted love. Neither the 
ideal man nor anything like him ever came round, as he should 
have done, and as he would probably have done if he had 
known, and we went on down the hill till we arrived at the 


358 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

monstrous-looking bulldog or the long-haired cat or even the 
canary bird; just the natural love and affection that’s in us 
and the care-taking instinct perverted. We, the girls and 
me, want the family love that rounds out our lives in a 
natural way and we want our school and our church and our 
neighborhood society and our other society if we can reach 
it.” 

“We don’t want much, do we?” interjected Jim as the 
amused smile continued. 

“Yes, we do. We want lots of things to be ours, just our 
own, not to be divided with you horrid men. We want our 
church because the church was specially made for women. 
It’s a woman’s club; and it’s her society meeting place; and it 
gives her an outlet for her society energies; and she wants 
to believe in religious things, anyway; and we want our 
schools and everything that clusters round the home life; 
everything that helps to make the perfect life for the girls 
and me; and we want to manage these accessory things in 
church and school and local society and we want to vote on 
them for they’re ours; not you horrid men’s. We don’t want 
your men’s politics or your men’s conventions or your men’s 
political platforms or your men’s chambers of commerce or 
your men’s boxing matches or your men’s football games. 
That’s your men’s world not ours; and we don’t want to vote 
in it nor help to govern it nor take any part in it except as 
spectators; and even as spectators the girls and me don’t 
understand or appreciate; no matter how hard we try or how 
much hypocrites we may be in seeming to understand or how 
much fake interest we show in the world of you crazy men, but 
we do understand and appreciate all the ins and outs and all 
the rules and regulations of our own world and all the games 
that are played in it; and it’s only the girls and me who do 
understand it. You big, strong, obtuse men can’t possibly 
understand it and I don’t believe you want to. No man can 
understand it or appreciate it no matter how much fake in¬ 
terest he seems to show in the things of our world either as 
participant or spectator.” 


359 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

“I see,” said Jim. “Two separate kingdoms!” 

“Yes, two separate kingdoms; and you horrid men are not 
superiors and the girls and me are not inferiors because we 
can't understand and appreciate and don't really care the 
slightest thing for your politics and your voting in elections 
and your bond elections and your money-raising elections 
and your lawmaking and law construing and your commercial 
ventures and your railroad building and your rough sports. 
The girls and me can't understand them because they're out¬ 
side our world. There's no use of our pretending to under¬ 
stand them or to take part in them. The girls and me at a 
political convention or in congress or at a big-league ball 
game or a boxing match or a banker's meeting or a chamber of 
commerce meeting or in a secret society or on a jury or on the 
judicial bench are just caretakers of femininity and feminin¬ 
ity's world out of place. It isn't because we're inferior; it's 
because that's not our world. The horrid men in the world 
that belongs to the girls and me are just as much out of place 
and just as much caricatures of masculinity. A big, strong 
man acting the sissy in the world belonging to the girls and 
me is the superlative in masculine helplessness. It isn't be¬ 
cause he's inferior to the real sissy who is always the joy of 
life in that same world where he is so wishy washy. It's be¬ 
cause he's out of his own world; strayed across the dividing 
lines where he doesn't belong.” 

“Go on with your philosophy. I’m learning slow but 
sure,” said Jim. 

“Then I'll tell you a whole lot more that I've learned. 
There can't be any question of superiority between men and 
women because there's no way to compare them. Their 
different worlds demand different abilities, mentalities, 
sympathies, lines of thought and action. There’s not a 
single thought, idea, aspiration, ambition, wish or reason in 
the heads of the girls and me that men harbor in their brains 
and no one of the thoughts, ideas, aspirations, wishes and 
ambitions that keep the brains of the horrid men seething 
ever enter even the vestibules of the minds of the girls and me. 


360 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

And this can’t be changed by law. Law can’t even begin to 
make equality where there is no natural grounds for equality; 
no basis for even laying a foundation. Law can’t make the 
girls and me engineers or railroad builders or financiers or 
politicians in a man’s world or football players, and law won’t 
make a big man a primary school teacher or a cook or a nurse 
in a hospital. 

“What I want to see is the horrid men go ahead and man¬ 
age their state and national politics and their political con¬ 
ventions and nominations and their law courts and legislatures 
and big industries and banks and big business and congress 
and ball games and wrestling matches and secret societies and 
all the other roughneck work of the man’s world without the 
girls and me taking any part in it. Then I want the girls 
and me to have our own congress, with our own president, 
meeting in our own woman’s way; discussing in our own way 
and settling in our own way the affairs of our own world. 
We would meet in beautiful rooms, with elegant decorations 
and furniture and easy plush chairs and there wouldn’t be 
any noise or confusion. We would pass our resolutions and 
our laws decorously. We might fight over them, and prob¬ 
ably would, but it would be a tearoom fight. We would be 
very earnest and serious in dealing with the affairs of our 
world and when we got through the acts of our legislative 
body would all be for the best interests of the home and its 
accessory units; and they would be ratified as law by the 
men’s congress. 

“We would want a legal division of the money. We would 
let the horrid men raise the money, but a certain part of all 
county, state, and national taxation should be ours absolutely 
and we would arrange our budget expenses accordingly. The 
girls and me would vote but it would be for the women can¬ 
didates to our own congress and no woman would vote for a 
man for anything; unless she were a taxpayer in her own 
name; and no man should vote for a woman candidate under 
any circumstances. We would manage our own world in 
our own way with our own money and no man would inter- 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 361 

fere. If there was some joint interest between our world and 
the other world there would be a union management of 
that joint interest and each would contribute a share. 

“If we have that kindof adivision and that kind of agovern- 
ment the girls and me would amount to something in the 
political world. We would govern our own domain and pay 
its expenses economically and honestly out of our own 
money. The women who made the laws of our world would 
understand us and we would understand them. Our politics 
would be the politics of the girls and me and would be as 
different from man’s politics as a social reception is different 
from a football game.” 

“It might be an interesting division,” said Jim. 

“It surely would be for us. As this political game is now 
conducted there isn’t the slightest interest in it for us. We 
don’t understand it. We’re crowded out because we’re 
neither interested in it nor understand it; and we can’t possi¬ 
bly learn it any more than we can learn baseball or football. 
No woman could ever learn to play either; and we don’t want 
to learn to play either them or men’s politics, anyway. We’re 
inferior and always will be in this politics because it’s a horrid 
man’s game and doesn’t belong in our world. But if we had 
our own woman’s congress with complete jurisdiction over the 
affairs that belong to the girls and me and our own money to 
run our own government we would show the men an example 
of efficiency and economy in management and expense and 
honesty that would be good for them to look at and profit 
by. The girls and me are capable all right. We’re not in¬ 
feriors. We’re just in another world groping around; strang¬ 
ers in a strange land. 

“I hate this horrid men’s politics. I’ve seen it close up. 
It’s not for the girls and me. It’s not in our world nor of our 
world and I’m not going to take part in it any more forever 
and ever; so there, Mr. Husband of mine; I’ve given you due 
and timely notice that I’ve quit. I’m thoroughly educated 
as to my unfitness to play men’s games and I’m just as edu¬ 
cated that I’m the one who can play the games of the girls 


362 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

and me and Pm going to play them exclusively hereafter. 
Now do you understand ?” 

Jim laughed a big hearty laugh. “All right, little girl. 
I guess you’re right. I’ve noticed something of the sort 
myself though I haven’t looked at it as seriously; in fact, 
hardly took time to view the situation. I think we have got 
one of the practical problems of the world of ‘the girls and me’ 
in Louise. Now, she’s all right for a few days while she’s in 
the care of the jailer’s wife and will have a comfortable home 
but we must make some arrangement for her when she 
leaves.” 

“I was going to speak about that. I wish we had caught 
her before she took that Southern trip. We can bring her 
out here for a time.” 

“Louise is going to be a problem for us,” said Jim. “For¬ 
tunately we have Doctor Partridge at hand and he has had 
experience with opiate patients. I believe if we could get 
her into the sisters’ hospital or sanatorium up on the hill 
that they could do more for her than anyone else in the world. 
I’ve the greatest faith in the sisters. Their discipline is as 
mild as turtle-dove regulations and it’s as firm as unyielding 
law. If Louise was with the sisters she would never know 
she was being governed. They would go ahead with the 
duties of their busy lives around her in their gentle way and 
she would have to fall into their ways of doing things. When 
it came ten o’clock she would retire and when it came day¬ 
light she would get up and there would be duties for her to 
perform every hour in the day. Their example would be 
worth worlds to her and I know they’d do anything they 
possibly could for her. If they got pay it would be all right 
and if they didn’t get much money because there was no 
money it would be all right. The sisters are without a doubt 
the completest organization for philanthropic work in the 
world. They are thoroughly good women devoting their en¬ 
tire lives to good deeds. Louise is not a bad girl and would 
appreciate, almost worship, the sisters I know, and they 
would like her for she’s a very likeable girl. We could pay all 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 363 

bills if she hasn’t the money and if she could put in a year with 
the sisters I believe it would save her. I have more faith in 
that plan than anything else I can think of.” 

“I think that’s a fine plan, too. Doctor Partridge could 
take charge of the drug part of the problem. We must see 
after her at once. I’ll drive in to-morrow and make ar¬ 
rangements for her to come here. We can take care of her 
and I know she can get rid of that drug habit. At any rate, 
it’s our duty to save her and I know we can.” 


CHAPTER XX 


C AN you have Delker and Barth come up to my 
office ?” the county attorney ’phoned down to the 
sheriff when the court house emptied after Jim’s trial 
and the hurrah had passed away down the street. A deputy 
came upstairs with them. 

“Well, it was a complete turnover,” he said as they came 
in and were seated. 

“Yes,” said Delker, savagely. “That petticoat spilled the 
beans. However, it’s not all over yet by a long shot.” 

“Barth,” said the prosecutor, “you made up this plot about 
the letters yourself, I understand. And you didn’t get the 
idea of it from Delker or anyone else ?” 

“No, I made it up myself.” 

“Did anyone tell you to do it or show you what to do?” 
“No, it was all my own.” 

“Well, I’ll take your statement and have it ready if called 
on by the court to show why Delker goes free. Delker, you 
may go any time. Barth takes the entire blame. As far as 
you’re concerned, Barth, I don’t see that you come under any 
criminal law in particular. You didn’t burglarize that house; 
just went in to write a letter on the other fellow’s machine. 
You didn’t steal anything. I don’t see that there’s any great 
legal liability on your part except that Big Jim could sue you 
for damages. However, we’d better keep up appearances. 
You’d better stay in jail for a few days till the excitement 
wears down. It will look better.” 

“Barth had dope on him when we searched him,” said the 
deputy. 

“That calls for a charge against you, Barth,” said the 
prosecutor. “It’s a good thing it comes up just now. It 

364 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 365 

would look queer if both you and Delker were turned loose. 
I’ll file a charge to-morrow morning on account of the dope 
and you can plead guilty. There’s no use of you fighting it. 
The sentence won’t be very heavy. Now you may go back 
with the deputy for the night. I’ll call you up in the morn¬ 
ing about ten.” 

“What’s the program now?” he asked as he and Delker were 
left alone. “Concentrate on the attorney and county com¬ 
missioners. It looks as if the sheriff had gone to Big Jim. 
We have to beat him later instead of now. It’s just a ques¬ 
tion of time. With a liberal county attorney and at least two 
liberal commissioners his hands will be tied up tight. He 
can’t get anywhere as sheriff as far as annoying us particularly 
is concerned.” 

The next morning there was a court recess for an hour on 
account of the delay in the case then in hand. The Judge 
was in his room when the prosecutor entered. “I wish you 
would look over this,” he said, handing the Judge a paper. 
It was a sworn statement of Red Barth. 

“He doesn’t implicate Delker in this,” said the Judge. 

“No, and Delker swears the same thing so you see where 
we’re at in holding Delker. Barth takes all the blame. 
And it’s pretty difficult to find a statute under which to 
prosecute Barth. I am looking up the law in his case now 
and it’s complicated. We have caught him though with 
dope in his pocket, probably for sale, and can bring him up on 
that charge and in the meantime look into the other more 
thoroughly.” 

“Do the best you can,” said the Judge. “I suppose there 
are many difficulties. There always are in dealing with this 
class of criminals.” 

“I’ll bring him up shortly on the dope charge,” said the 
prosecutor. 

In a short time the sheriff appeared in the court room with 
Red; the towering, bulky form of the officer contrasting 
strikingly with the shrunken figure of the alleged criminal. 
The court room was full of people waiting for the next case 


366 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

to open and as the two appeared there was an extra craning of 
necks. 

The prosecutor came in and stood up before the Judge’s 
stand with a bunch of papers in his hand, motioning Barth 
to stand up beside him. Barth stood up, pale, almost white, 
though not from fear. His eyes were lusterless. Evidently 
he hadn’t slept through the night. He was trembling slightly 
though making an effort to suppress all signs of it. His 
hair was tousled. He almost shambled along as he walked; 
seemingly seeing nothing, heeding nothing. He looked and 
acted like a human derelict and the most obtuse observer 
could note that here was going to be enacted one of the minor 
tragedies of life; a human being was to play his little, sorrow¬ 
ful, sordid one act and then be hustled off the stage; disappear 
and be forgotten. 

The prosecuting attorney read the information after the 
Judge appeared; charging in the lingo of legal words that this 
defendant, Red Barth, did then and there at a certain time 
and place have in his possession a certain amount of morphine 
with the intent then and there to sell and dispose of the 
same. 

“Have you an attorney?” asked the Judge as he looked 
down half pityingly at the disheveled figure of the dope 
addict. Barth somewhat waked up at the question. “No, 
I don’t need a lawyer,” he answered wearily. 

“Have you money with which to employ one?” 

“Yes, but I don’t want a lawyer.” 

“What have you to say to this charge?” asked the Judge. 
“Are you guilty or not guilty?” Barth ran one trembling 
hand through his uncombed hair and gazed blankly ahead. 

“Do you wish to plead guilty or not guilty to this charge?” 
again asked the Judge after waiting for a considerable time. 

“Oh, I’m guilty all right, I guess. I had the dope. But,” 
he went on, and a more intelligent look came into his eyes, 
“I wasn’t going to sell it. I wanted it for myself. I wish I 
had some of it now to quiet this shaking hand and, Judge, if 
these fellows who made this law and these fellows who en- 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 367 

force this law had been crucified with me in my grated cell 
through the thousand long years of the last twenty hours 
they would wipe the law off the books. Why should my 
personal liberty be interfered with ? I had the dope; came by 
it honestly; made a tremendous sacrifice to get it; it was all 
mine. I was going to use it myself; it was going to harm no 
one nor interfere with any human being. Why should my 
personal liberty be interfered with under these circumstances? 
Why shouldn’t I have my dope? One little smidgin of that 
stuff, just a tiny little speck, would be the salvation of my 
life right now.” 

The audience was startled at the dramatic earnestness and 
the logic behind his plea; some of the old-time brilliance of the 
university graduate being visible. 

“I’m not here to argue the matter with you,” said the 
Judge kindly, “but your personal liberty has been interfered 
with because the use of these drugs is a vice that grows on the 
individual and community. They obliterate the moral per¬ 
ceptions and wreck the health of the user. That is why 
there’s a law to provide a penalty, even for their illegal posses¬ 
sion, and a court to enforce it. From your statements here in 
making your plea, Mr. Barth, I think you need an attorney 
and-” 

“May I have three minutes to show your Honor that I 
should go free?” broke in Barth eagerly as his voice took on a 
new timbre and his eyes brightened with a somewhat re¬ 
gained intelligence. He was now alert and earnest. 

“You may have the three minutes,” said the Judge. 

“I am an opium addict,” said Barth, straightening up. 
“I buy opium and use it myself. I sell it not. My opium 
harms no one except perhaps myself. I am an American 
citizen. I have the American citizen’s right of personal 
liberty in this matter. It is true I would lie and steal to get 
opium if it is denied me. Judge, let me tell you; I’m not 
different morally from the people in this room. I’m not 
more criminal than they. Technically, I may be; ethically, 
I’m not. The temptation came to me to violate an unjust 


368 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

and arbitrary law; it didn't come to them; that makes the 
difference. If it had come to them they, too, would have 
broken the same law. 

“Here is a fact, Judge, a tobacco user is in every way akin 
to a dope fiend like me. He acquires the habit. So does the 
dopester. He gets deathly sick to learn the habit. So does 
the dopester. The tobacco habit obliterates moral percep¬ 
tion; respect for the rights of others; respect for any law or 
rule of society that interferes with the use of tobacco. It 
breeds cynical, selfish, brutal disregard of the welfare of all 
those who come in contact with the user. 

“I saw lawyers and laymen when I came in fill this room 
with tobacco smoke till it hung like a blue pall in the air; 
detrimental to the brain and health of all the public; yet not 
one smoker would forego one whiff because of this infringe¬ 
ment of the plain rights of others. Their sense of moral 
perception is gone; is frozen; is dead; tobacco killed it; dope 
could do no worse. If a law were made prohibiting tobacco 
there isn’t a confirmed user in this room that wouldn’t evade 
that law if they could do so; even to lying and stealing to get 
tobacco. They would fill the air world-wide with their asser¬ 
tions of their personal liberty rights; their rights to infringe 
on the rights of others while enjoying their tobacco themselves. 
I assert no such right. My dope doesn’t affect others. 

“The tobacco user’s moral perceptions have fled and a 
maniacal perversion has taken their place. He has no 
respect for the property rights of others. He will burn and 
destroy property rather than forego his smoke. I saw a 
lawyer ten minutes ago empty his still going pipe into the 
waste paper basket filled with waste paper. I’ve seen 
smokers light up in powder magazines, in dry as tinder shingle 
mills, on strawstacks at threshing time. They will blow up 
coal mines and kill hundreds of their fellow workmen and 
start forest fires that destroy millions in lumber. They do 
not do these criminal things maliciously. They are un¬ 
conscious of their criminality. Their vice has obliterated 
their moral obligation perception; their ethical obligation 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 369 

perception; and the same vice has filled its place with a self¬ 
ish, arbitrary, practically inhuman perversion; and they don’t 
realize that this change has taken place. 

“Every smoker, no matter what his rank or place in society 
may be, is calloused as far as observing the rights of his 
neighbor or his friend or his family are concerned. No 
smoker cares a hoot for the comfort or well being of his social 
intimates when the urge of his smoke is on him because his 
vice has murdered his moral and social and community 
ethical perceptions and created a Frankenstein monster to 
take their place in his brain and act when they are called on 
in perverted functioning; and he doesn’t know he is harbor¬ 
ing a perversion. 

“If the millions of tobacco users, who are constantly violat¬ 
ing the rights of their fellow men, can entrench themselves 
behind the barrier of American personal liberty and get away 
with it why should I be punished for having my dope that 
neither injures nor interferes with any living soul except my¬ 
self?” 

The talk came like a whirlwind and the keen thrusts were 
enjoyed as he went along. “Mr. Barth,” said the Judge, 
“you will remember there is a law against the use of the drugs 
but none against tobacco. I will sentence you to ninety 
days in the county jail for your offence under the law. Call 
the next case, Mr. Clerk.” 


CHAPTER XXI 


T HE next morning Jim and Mary started for town to 
see Louise. “We’ll call on Doctor Partridge first and 
get his views. I don’t know enough about this dope 
business to talk intelligently on it,” said Jim. 

“Yes, Louise can be cured or rather cure herself,” said the 
doctor. “It’s a matter of will power with her. Get her to 
go to the sisters’ hospital as you suggest. They’ll take more 
interest in her than a hired nurse will because the hired nurse 
wouldn’t look after her all the twenty-four hours. They will. 
And they’ll take a personal interest in her and that’s what she 
needs. Also while she is with them she will naturally con¬ 
form to their regulations and that quiet, gentle, busy routine 
will be the discipline Louise needs after the city whirl she has 
been living in. The sisters are wise, too, even if they do 
move round in slippers of silence at their work. Get them 
to give her work to do even if they don’t pay her anything. 
They will know Louise like a book in a week. I’ll look after 
her allowance of morphine and give her less and less till she 
gets none. It will be a several months’ battle but we’ll 
win. I will not charge Louise anything for my fee. I 
knew her father and mother and herself and little Ben and 
I’ll just look after her for old friendship’s sake and to save 
the girl.” 

“All right, Doctor, that’s fine,” said Jim. “We’ll bring 
her out to our house and we’ll talk with her and you can talk 
with her and have a perfect understanding before we begin. 
I’ll explain to her and she’ll come to see you to-morrow.” 

They found Louise helping the jailer’s wife to wash the 
breakfast dishes and already one of the family. “I wish I 
could keep her,” said Mrs. Wilson. “She’s a wonderful 

370 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 371 

girl.” Jim ’phoned the prosecutor and was told Louise might 
go any time. 

“I’m going to help you do your housework, Mary,” she 
said as she took an old kimono from her traveling bag after 
they had reached Jim’s. “I don’t believe I’ve forgotten 
how. You know mama was rated an excellent housekeeper.” 
In ten minutes she was working round the house like a hired 
girl and laughing and talking as if she never had a trouble in 
her life. 

After dinner was over Jim explained the plan they had 
talked over and asked her opinion. “That’s fine,” she said. 
“I’ll try with all my might. I know what I’m up against 
for I’ve tried it before by myself but I’ll go into this prepared 
to die before I give up. And then I’ll be among good friends 
all the time and no temptation. That’s what gets us; the 
eternal, ever-present temptation. We can never get away 
from it in the city. It’s waiting for us on every street corner. 
I’ll go over and talk with Doctor Partridge right away and 
we’ll start in. I’m so glad. I’m going to beat old King 
Morphine in three months. That won’t be so very long. 
Say, that’ll be the greatest victory ever won and I’m going to 
win it. Why, one of my friends, a young woman, too, 
knocked out one of her gold-filled teeth and pawned the gold 
to get money to buy morphine. Now think of that depth of 
degrading slavery; how strong the urging must have been. 
And think that I’m going to get free from it. Yes, I’ll die 
before I’ll give up this time.” 

After she returned from seeing Doctor Partridge they all 
drove to the sisters’ big hopsital. They were ushered into a 
reception room and Sister Angeline, the Superioress, came in. 
She knew Jim and Mary and greeted Louise kindly. Jim 
wasted no time beating round the bush. He frankly told 
the sister the situation in all its aspects. 

“If Louise is willing to try real hard she can be free from all 
desire for morphine in a comparatively short time,” said the 
sister. “I know that because we have had several cases 
that have been completely cured; good people, too. You see 


372 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

it’s not a disgrace to have the morphine habit. It’s just un¬ 
fortunate and a pity. It may come to anyone through in¬ 
judicious use in sickness. But while not a disgrace it’s a 
deadly habit; a slow death habit and sometimes not so slow, 
either. Now, Louise, if you have a will to be cured you can 
come here and I know you can be cured. The question is not 
for us to answer. It’s for you. Do you want to be cured bad 
enough to really try?” 

‘Til do anything, anything at all, no matter what it is, to 
just get free.” 

“Very good,” said the sister. “We’ll give you some light 
work and you can be a sort of free occupant here. Our reg¬ 
ulations are not so very burdensome. While here you will 
be under our care and you can go into the city with one of our 
sisters when they go and you can receive visitors in their 
presence. We enforce these rules very strictly. Now when 
can you come?” 

“I want Louise to stay at our house till to-morrow after¬ 
noon, at any rate,” said Mary. 

“To-morrow afternoon is well,” said the sister. “You’ll 
find a welcome awaiting you here, Louise, to-morrow after¬ 
noon at three. Your room will be ready then. Perhaps 
Doctor Partridge could call us up in the meantime. Now 
don’t forget, Louise, that we’re all your friends here,” she 
said as she bowed them out. 

Louise went back in high spirits and set to work at the 
housework with renewed vigor. Her mother had taught her 
how to work with the greatest efficiency and she liked to keep 
house. “When I was in Portland,” she told Mary, “I was 
stopping at a high-class family boarding house while I was 
stenographer for a big lumber company and I used to take care 
of my own room, just because I liked to do it, and I’d go down 
in the kitchen and putter around and help the chef. You 
know cooks are awful cranky about having strange people 
bothering around in their kitchens but he said I’d been taught 
the basic ideas of good cookery somewhere and he’d let me 
fuss around and help and I’d rather do that than go to the 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 373 

shows. I like to cook and keep house and some day I’m go¬ 
ing to have a home of my own and it’ll be kept just as nice as 
I can keep it and the breakfasts and dinners and suppers 
will be just as perfect as I can make them and I’ll have nice 
furniture and pictures and flowers scattered around and 
I’ll not care then about the old outside world. My house 
will be all the world I care for.” 

The twenty-four hours passed away on swift wings. “We’ll 
be ready in fifteen minutes to go to town,” said Jim over the 
’phone from the barn. 

“Do you know,” said Louise to Mary as they sat waiting: 
“I’ve got a new idea. I’ve listened to you and Mr. Albright 
pray night and morning and if I had faith like that I could 
beat old King Morphine without going to any sanatorium. 
I’m going to pray, too, from now on. I need strength and 
will power and I’m sure I can get it through faith and I can 
pray till I get the faith. I’m going to be a Christian, too. I 
see it’s the only life and I’m going to come out of the sana¬ 
torium cured of the drug habit and a Christian. I’m going 
to pray for help and I know God won’t forget even me.” 

“And you can always remember, dear, that I’m praying 
for you, too, and Jim and the minister and all our people. 
You’ll not be forgotten any day,” said Mary. “Just pray 
for Christian grace and faith and strength to do God’s will 
and He will surely hear and answer.” 

“I will,” said Louise. “I know I’ve found the right way at 
last.” 

They found Sister Angeline and two other sisters waiting 
for them and received a very cordial greeting from each. 
“Sister Teresa will show you to your room, Louise, and will 
talk to you about your daily work. You will meet the other 
sisters later on and they’ll be glad to welcome you.” 

“I feel that the fight will be successful,” said Jim as they 
drove away. “But it will surely be a fight in dead earnest. 
I was talking to the doctor about it and I never knew the drug 
habit was as hard to shake loose from. He says the mor¬ 
phine habit is easier to cure than cocaine and cocaine is easier 


374 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

than heroin. I’m glad Louise’s case is morphine and not 
cocaine or heroin or some of even the worse drugs than these. 
There’s our friend Delker out in his car. I suppose he was 
turned loose last night and probably Red Barth is also out by 
this time. Such is the condition we’re up against. It’s 
rotten!” 

Mary made daily calls at the hospital with a bouquet of 
flowers for Louise but never stayed longer than a moment or 
two. One day she found Louise at an idle hour, something 
very rare, and she stayed longer. “The experience here is 
wonderful,” said Louise. “ It’s an entirely different universe. 
The sisters just devote their entire lives to the service of 
strangers who are sick and suffering. Their self-sacrifice is 
far away beyond the knowledge and range of vision of the 
people who live in the world I have lived in. We couldn’t 
realize the world of these sisters and yet they’re happier 
just doing good to miserable humanity from morning till 
night than we were and we never thought of anything but our¬ 
selves. They’re very nice to me. I’ve branched out and am 
assistant to Sister Teresa and help her with her patients. It’s 
the most interesting work in the world even if it is hard work 
and long hours. I know all the sisters now and we’re quite 
chummy. They’re so good that I’d do anything for them. 
Why, I wouldn’t break one of their regulations for anything. 
I’m getting along fine with my own fight, too.” 

“That’s the best news,” said Mary. 

“When I feel depressed and a craving for the drug I just pray 
and the worse the craving the more I pray. It helps me, too. 
I know there’s someone listening who understands and can 
give me strength and I always get it. I get renewed courage 
every time I pray and stronger faith and I’m going to conquer 
morphine by prayer; and I’m praying for Christian grace as 
well and I’m going to be a real Christian. I’m not the only one 
here. There are others; some much worse than I am. I’ve 
begun to taper off and am going to win.” 

As they drove home Jim turned through the city streets. 
He was recognized by hundreds of men and women and 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 375 

greeted with bows and smiles. His journey from block to 
block was almost an ovation. A short time ago he was a 
stranger here; now he was a familiar figure. The trial had 
made him so. Then he had been met with cold avoidance 
by the few who did know him. Now the multitude lionized 
him. “Big Jim Albright Club” was painted on a huge 
canvas over a doorway in the business center. Below these 
words was painted “Enforce All The Laws.” A stream of 
men and women was flowing in and out of the club room. 
A big automobile flashed past as they got near the edge of the 
city. It was Lew Delker. 

They met another auto and the driver stopped. It was 
Caledon. “Hello, Mr. Albright,” he said, “we’ve got a 
club going in every precinct. Everybody’s joining. Con¬ 
gratulations on your already won victory.” 

“Thanks,” said Jim. “We’ll share the triumph.” 

“The country doesn’t seem to be inhabited by the same 
people as we saw here a month ago,” said Mary. 

“Same people, only we’re seeing the other side of them 
now. They had their backs to us then,” said Jim. “I see 
some of the fellows are making preparations for our night 
school to-night. They’re fixing up the rooms already. I’d 
a thousand times rather be among them to-night than out 
electioneering.” 

“It seems to me,” said Mary, “that the senior class is 
rather running away with us. I’ve a hard time trying to 
answer some of the questions they raise in civil government 
and economics.” 

“Yes, those European bred people are skilled in their own 
kind of economic lore and they’re students. A person needs 
to deal in fundamentals with them or they’ll trip a fellow up, 
but I like the way they take hold. After all, humanity is 
pretty much alike. They’re not so different if we only know 
it.” 

The night school, Mary’s Americanization plan, had de¬ 
veloped far beyond its original bounds. The more advanced 
classes had practically taken the work of instruction of the 


376 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

beginners out of the hands of the teachers and were doing it 
at home. They could all talk and read English now and the 
keen grasp of many of the older people of the knowledge pre¬ 
sented was wonderful. The most advanced classes kept the 
teachers on tiptoe. Jim had thrown the primary work on 
student teachers and devoted his time mostly to history and 
civics. 

When the school met this night all the procedure showed 
the evolution from a rather ragged beginning. The assembly 
room had been draped with American flags. Scattered 
around under them were small flags of all the nations repre¬ 
sented in the school. The opening exercises for this night 
were in the hands of the Polish students. Last school night 
it had been in the hands of the French. Before that the 
German and Russian and Greeks and Italians and Scandina¬ 
vians and other nationalities had each a night to themselves. 
At the opening all united in singing “America.” Then the 
Polish students sang their national song. This was followed 
by an historical contrast between Lincoln and Kosciusko by 
one of the Poles. 

These historic characters were clearly outlined; their his¬ 
tory reviewed; their influence on civilization noted and com¬ 
pared. The evening previous it had been the French national 
song by the French group and a contrast of Lincoln and 
Gambetta. The Germans had sung and had illustrated Bis¬ 
marck’s career. The Russians had their night and outlined 
the career of Peter the Great. All the other groups had 
shown the historic outline of some one of their greatest 
national statesmen. It was an educative idea. There was 
rivalry in the singing. There were well-trained voices in all 
the groups, the older people being decidedly musical; much 
more so than Americans. After this opening program the 
classes divided and went to their rooms. Some of the classes 
also met now several times each week and many of the 
students studied after hours. 

Jim was a target for questions of all sorts as the class work 
went ahead and discussions arose over present-day problems. 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 377 

He had inaugurated the plan of allowing full freedom of 
expression of opinions. “The American courts’’ was the sub¬ 
ject in civics to-night. The class had investigated the sub¬ 
ject and Jim saw there were various popular opinions held by 
most of them; also old-world opinions showed up. 

“The courts have no right to declare any act of congress 
unconstitutional,” asserted one of the students. 

“Let us get the fundamentals right,” said Jim. “Who 
founded the supreme court and the other courts?” 

“The constitution made the president the executor of the 
laws; congress the maker of the laws, and the supreme court 
and the other courts the interpreter of what the law means. 
The constitution designated congress as the establisher of all 
federal courts below the supreme court.” 

“That seems to be exactly right. Now let us get the 
fundamental facts straight and let us be sure of our facts. 
Who made the constitution?” 

“The people.” 

“Yes, the people made the constitution and then the 
constitution provides the plan for making the presidents 
and the courts and congress. The constitution then is the 
foundation of the American government. It existed before 
congress. Congress was created by some of its clauses. 
It is superior to congress. Congress can’t destroy any part 
of the constitution; not even one word. 

“When congress passes a law it is done with that law. 
It can’t interpret the law judicially. That is assigned to the 
courts. It can’t enforce the law. That is assigned to the 
president. 

“If congress had the power to make a law and then inter¬ 
pret it congress could destroy the American government by 
making laws that would destroy parts of the constitution. 
Congress has made many such laws. The organizers of the 
government foresaw this and didn’t give congress the power 
to interpret its own laws. They created the courts as spe¬ 
cialist bodies for that one work; to interpret and apply laws. 

“When congress passes a law it can be brought before the 


378 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

courts for interpretation. The court asks: ‘What does the 
constitution say?’ Then it asks: ‘What does this law say?’ 
If the law destroys part of the constitution the court says so 
and declares the law is no law because congress can’t destroy 
any part of the constitution. Clearly the courts have that 
right.” 

“Well, can congress pass a law and command the supreme 
court to not interfere with that law; to not declare it 
unconstitutional, by putting a clause of command at the 
end of the law?” 

“Yes, congress can pass any law it wishes. In such a 
case the supreme court would undoubtedly calmly disregard 
the command of congress because congress is not the boss 
of the supreme court and if that very law were brought 
before the supreme court in a regular manner it would 
no doubt proceed to declare what it meant. If the law 
destroyed part of the constitution the court would so 
declare and would also declare that the constitution was su¬ 
perior to the law. That would end the law and also the 
command of congress.” 

“ I see that congress may pass a law declaring that five of the 
nine supreme court justices can’t declare any law unconstitu¬ 
tional as was done by that court in the income tax decision 
and a few other extremely important cases. Can congress 
say that in such cases the opinion must be agreed to by all the 
justices?” 

“Yes, congress can pass such a law but the supreme court 
would undoubtedly ignore it. The rules of procedure of the 
supreme court are made by the supreme court. The rules of 
congress are made by congress. The supreme court has no 
power to interfere with the rules of congress. Its sole power 
is judicial. Congress can’t interfere with or modify this 
supreme court rule. Its sole power is legislative and that 
would not be legitimate legislation. It could ask the su¬ 
preme court to change the rule but it clearly cannot com¬ 
mand it.” 

“Is it not a fact that the courts in the United States have 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 379 

more power now than the president or congress owing partly 
to their usurpation of certain powers in these later days?” 

“Yes, they have more power than either the president or 
congress but in only one way. To the courts in America 
is given the power of maintaining the American form of 
government. The president or congress or the governors or 
legislatures might overturn part of our national or our state 
constitutions; the foundation of our government. While 
the courts are on guard they cannot do this. Corrupt judges 
or incompetent judges or cowardly judges or biased judges, 
such as radical socialist or communist judges, could unite 
with the executive and legislative bodies and overturn the 
American government by destroying parts of the constitution; 
that is by agreeing to laws that destroyed parts of it. The 
constitution is in the keeping of the judges. They ward off 
all attacks. Our American government to-day is based on 
the conservatism, the patriotism, the intellectual grasp, the 
honesty, and the breadth and depth of legal and historic 
knowledge of the judges. A communist or a socialist judge 
in the United States is a national calamity for our govern¬ 
ment. Our civilization is anti-socialist and anti-communist. 
Any president who appoints a justice of the supreme court 
or a circuit or district judge who is tinctured with communism 
acts traitorously toward our constitution.” 

“Well,” queried another student, “the English judges 
don’t declare their laws unconstitutional.” 

“No, the English have no written constitution as we have. 
When parliament passes an act there and the King assents 
to it that act is law. The courts must enforce it. The 
British government rests not on the courts, as ours does, but 
on the intelligence, honesty, patriotism, intellectual grasp 
and breadth of knowledge of the men who make the laws. 
Up to the present time the standard in these respects of the 
law makers of England has been very high. The educated 
leaders of the British Empire have made her laws. The 
British government has been anti-communist and anti¬ 
socialist. 


3 8o BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

“We can see a change there. Just how much of a change 
is yet to be revealed. A party that is frankly communist, 
socialist, and class conscious is in temporary power. It 
may be that it is the beginning of the end of the British Em¬ 
pire. The colonies of Britain have remained loyal under 
the former form of government. They respected the intelli¬ 
gence that governed the Empire. They almost worshiped 
the traditions of the Empire. They probably will not re¬ 
main loyal to even a tincture of communism in Downing 
Street. Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and South Africa 
are anti-communist and will break away from communism 
in England if it asserts itself as a governing power. Britain 
must either maintain her former high standard of law makers 
on whose patriotic intelligence the government rested or else 
establish a written constitution, as we have done, guarded 
by her courts, or else go to pieces.” 

Thus did Jim have to fight his way along. Every night 
in some of the classes questions were raised that had to be 
answered. The questions were respectful but generally 
had old-world views. Other times there came from the 
most unexpected quarters elucidations of most intricate 
problems that all enjoyed listening to and when Jim found one 
of these treasures he sidetracked everything else and en¬ 
couraged the student to go ahead at any length. Some eve¬ 
nings the class lesson would be adjourned altogether while 
some special subject that had been accidentally struck was 
gone into and explained by some student who had specialized 
in it. 

Several times the question of religion bobbed up and it 
could be noted that a number of the attenders had read works 
on comparative religions. “The foundation of the Christian 
religion seems to be insecure,” said a student one night in the 
sociology class. “The books of the Bible were written, it 
seems, long after the actors in the scenes were dead and the 
different books stretch over a thousand years in their being 
written and no one seems to know the authors for sure.” 

“Tm not prepared to discuss that part of the problem,” 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 381 

answered Jim. “I don’t read Aramaic or Hebrew or Yiddish 
or the old dead Greek or any Greek. I’m content to accept 
the authority of nineteen hundred years of Christian experts 
on those questions. Now, I’m a Christian. I believe that 
Christ died for sinners and that I can be saved through Him. 
I believe in the rules and regulations of Christianity; that I 
should do unto others as I would like others to do unto me; 
that I should be meek and merciful and follow the regulations 
of Christianity in my daily life. Now am I a more undesirable 
citizen because I believe in these Christian rules?” 

“No, they make any man a more desirable citizen; more 
law abiding; more civilized.” 

“Well, then, that settles it for this world,” said Jim. “Now 
I believe that I can be saved through Christ. Now suppos¬ 
ing I am wrong will I be any worse off when I come to die 
because of that belief and because I act on that belief by 
going to church; keeping the Sabbath holy; praying to God 
and trying to keep the Christian observances?” 

“No, if you’re wrong in your belief you’ll be just as well 
off when you come to die as any unbeliever. These Christian 
observances injure no one.” 

“Now,” said Jim, “supposing, on the contrary, that I’m 
right in my belief, am I not in a better condition when I come 
to pass away than the unbeliever?” 

“Certainly you are if you are right.” 

“Then I have everything to gain and nothing to lose.” 

“Yes, that’s it exactly, but I can’t understand this mys¬ 
terious experiencing of salvation that Christians tell about. 
It seemingly can’t be explained.” 

“Well,” said Jim, “no mortal can explain human love or 
affection either. Two people who never saw each other be¬ 
fore, meet, are attracted, fall in love. Explain it. Your 
words are meaningless; your explanation itself is a riddle. 
The explanation needs an explanation. There are many 
things in the world around us, in our daily life, that can’t be 
explained. If I, an individual, tell you of my Christian ex¬ 
perience you may doubt it. You never had such a Christian 


382 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

experience and you can’t understand it. But if ten million 
people tell you of the same Christian experience in each of their 
cases you cannot doubt it. The evidence is too overwhelm¬ 
ing. It is evidence that would be taken in any court as 
complete proof. We don’t explain this mysterious experience 
so the inexperienced can understand it any more than we 
explain the love we have for our sweetheart or our wife or 
child to the individual who never had such a love. He 
couldn’t understand that, either. We accept this Christian 
experience and go on our way rejoicing and we always want 
to share it with others. God supplies a limitless amount of 
His grace to earnest seekers. There is enough for us all and 
millions more. There’s no use arguing about Christianity 
or any other religion. Just apply ordinary common sense 
to any part of the problem and the argument difficulties 
evaporate.” 

“I guess that’s true,” said the student. “I’ve never 
reached anywhere by a religious argument.” 

“I note one thing that is very gratifying,” said Reverend 
Story to his wife one evening after church. “The Bible class 
and Sunday-school are growing out of bounds. A great deal 
of the increase is from the attenders at the night school. I 
thank God we have the example of the Christian teachers 
there among the foreign born. The example of their daily 
life is an inspiration to these boys and girls and they’re flock¬ 
ing to the church.” 


CHAPTER XXII 


I ’LL show you something to prove that we’re not falling 
down on our program even if we did get a hard jolt in the 
outcome of Big Jim’s trial and the jailing of Red,” said 
Delker to one of his confidential friends as they sat in his 
office one evening after the trial. “You see that big bunch 
of men there?” and he pointed down the street two blocks to 
a garage where a large number of workmen, evidently lumber¬ 
jacks and roustabouts, were congregated. “That’s part of 
our force; one hundred and fifty men in that bunch. You 
may have noticed in the papers of the revival of lumber 
activity in various parts of this country. Here’s last night’s 
Clarion. Read this head: ‘Lumber camps start up.’ ‘Half 
a dozen districts see a revival of lumbering under full swing.’ 
‘Mills to start next.’ That’s my work. I brought that 
hundred and fifty men in and we’re scattering laborers all 
over this district. We’ve men out in all the large cities pick¬ 
ing up workmen wherever they can be found and shipping 
them in here. We have three men in British Columbia doing 
the same. We’re planting them out and when election comes 
we’ll vote the entire bunch on our side.” 

“But they’ll not be on time for the primary.” 

“Some of them will, all right. A single barrel of whiskey 
properly distributed will get a lot of these fellows to prove 
their residence in the state for the required year. Get one 
of these fellows just so drunk and he’ll swear almost anything 
for more whiskey. It won’t be hard to persuade them to vote 
against prohibition, anyway.” 

“I would think it would arouse suspicion and be somewhat 
dangerous.” 

“It does to a certain extent, but all our enterprises are 
383 


384 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

bona-fide. We’re paying our way. We begin lumbering 
in a certain district back in the woods. If there’s a prohib 
back there farming or a dozen of them we buy liberally from 
them; anything they’ve got to sell. Money talks in loud 
tones even to a prohib. We’re working under half-a-dozen 
different company names and have camps all over the interior 
now. If a man quits us and is paid off at one camp and goes 
to another company’s camp that’s all right as far as we’re 
concerned. He’s our man, anyway, no matter for whom he 
works.” 

“ Pretty expensive, isn’t it ?” 

“Oh, not so bad. We’re working on the vertical plan. You 
know a very powerful coterie of capitalists in Germany have 
what they call vertical corporations. That is they have 
companies, all under one head, that take the raw material 
from the time it is dug out of the ground and manufacture it 
and handle it in all ways till it’s sold in some distant part 
of the world. Ships and railroads and factories and mer¬ 
cantile establishments are owned by the one big concern. 
We’re working on the same plan as far as we can. Catch ’em 
coming and going is our motto. We ship in five thousand 
men. We take contracts to do lumbering or grading or 
quarrying or anything else that we can work laborers at. We 
don’t care a rap what it is so long as we can get pay for it. 
If we get our expenses out of it it’s all right; if we don’t it’s 
all right. We’ll get something in the way of pay. In some 
places we make good money. In others not so much but we 
always get part of our expenses. We plant our men in 
bunches; not too many in a bunch; but a lot of bunches work¬ 
ing for these different companies. Then we work in the other 
part of our vertical scheme.” 

“How’s that?” 

“Well, if we’ve got five thousand men—I don’t know how 
many we’ve got but a good many thousand—we plant them 
in and then plant near-by some place, handy to them, a soft 
drink house, just an innocent-looking candy and cigar and 
tobacco and soft drink store. It sells our brand of whiskey 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 385 

for snake bites only. There are no venomous snakes in this 
district but there are garter snakes and toads and they may 
get vicious and bite the men. We pay these men four 
dollars a day and charge them one dollar per day for board. 
That leaves them three dollars. We figure to get two and a 
half of that back for snake bite cure. In some cases we get 
the whole three dollars and a good deal more. Two dollars 
and a half’s worth of whiskey will cost us all of fifteen cents 
and also the cost of retailing it, say twenty cents more. 
We get nearly all the wages back through the soft drink house 
and if we get any money out of the contracts we’re ahead of 
the game financially.” 

“And you’ve got the votes?” 

“Yes, that’s our main object. When it comes to the 
election we’ll be liberal with the snake bite remedy and 
that’ll handle the votes for us. Voters don’t have to register 
out in the country. All the army of colonized laborers will 
vote against the prohibs. We’ll see to that, and I’ll guarantee 
it’ll kill off a lot of sure-thing hopes. Big Jim may get 
through or he may not, but not one of the other fellows will.” 
As Delker made these boasts he and his companion emptied 
several glasses of probably the same whiskey he was going to 
retail to the laborers. At the close he was much under the 
influence of whiskey. 

“How’s business generally?” asked his companion. 

“Booming, never was so good. It’s coming in by the boat¬ 
load and carload and autoload. There’s more sellers of 
whiskey and more buyers of whiskey than there ever was. 
We’ve bought control of all the trade in the northwest except 
that we can’t keep a few moonshine dabblers from working 
independent. We’ve all the main trade; the big trade. 
We’ve got the selling places all controlled. I’ve put every¬ 
thing I have into it and more and I’m cleaning up a million. 
A good deal of the property I’ve got hold of isn’t worth 
much outside its whiskey trade value but it’s hundred-per¬ 
cent. property for that use and we’re going to sell whiskey 
no matter who comes or goes in the offices. The whiskey 


386 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

trade is too big now to be killed off. All they can do is 
bother us.” 

“It’s a continual fight though.” 

“That’s what it is. I never worked so hard in my life 
before. Since that trial Tve been on the run night and day, 
first in one direction, then in the other. But it’s running 
smooth now again and I can see we’re a winner. Excuse me 
now, I must get out to the freight yards; two carloads to be 
in there at dark. The railroad crew has to be looked after.” 

His companion watched Delker as he drove off. “Lew’s 
drinking a good deal himself these days,” he said half aloud. 
“He’s drunk now. He told me a lot of stuff I’d never have 
heard if he hadn’t been too full of his own brand of whiskey. 
When the wine is in the wit is out. I’ve noticed him lately 
and he’s going to the bow wows if he keeps up that lick. 
A man that’s drunk at ten in the morning and ten at night is 
on the straight road to a smash-up. If he keeps going where 
he’s headed for to-day he’ll wreck his own machine in less 
than six months if some other fellow doesn’t wreck it for him. 
And he says he’s put all his money in the game; took a gam¬ 
bler’s chance. It seems to me if ever I’m going to get in on 
this easy money I’ll have to do it right away. I’ve got 
enough inside knowledge now so I should be valuable; or 
dangerous. I’ll think it over.” 


CHAPTER XXIII 

T HE day of the primary election came on. There 
seemed to be some stir in both city and country but 
not much showed on the surface. Jim and Mary went 
to the polls and voted and chatted with their neighbors. 
The Big Jim Albright Club of that precinct was represented 
by challengers, that is vote watchers. Another committee 
was out with autos drumming up votes for Big Jim but that 
was hardly necessary as everyone in that precinct was voting 
for him anyway and it was a sort of make-believe political 
activity. 

Jim and Mary drove into the city late in the afternoon. 
A party of their friends gathered around them in the hotel and 
discussed matters generally. “I noticed something,” said 
one of them, “that all the life there is in this primary is in the 
two organizations that work: the Big Jim clubs and the 
whiskey clubs. If it weren’t for them it would be a dead 
election.” 

“That’s right,” said another. “Where there’s no party 
convention and no party platform there’s no party organiza¬ 
tion and no one to look after the election except individuals. 
It’s a good thing these Big Jim clubs sprung up or there 
wouldn’t have been a fight at all. I doubt if there would 
have been over one fifth the vote polled.” 

“You mean the whiskeyites would have had it all their own 
way.” 

“That’s just what anyone would mean and agree to. 
Whiskey is always organized. It votes together without any 
organization.” 

“It’s organized in this campaign all right,” said another. 
“I was one of the challengers in our ward up to two o’clock. 

387 


3 88 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

It’s in the lower part of the city. They voted the under¬ 
world men and women there before ten o’clock; marched them 
to the polls in battalions. They had them all registered on 
time and they were legal voters. The vote of any one of those 
people, who are outside the boundaries of decent society, 
killed the vote of one of the respectable business men of the 
city, and, as you say, if it hadn’t been for the Big Jim clubs 
there would have been no one on guard.” 

“But it’s worse out in the country where there’s no regis¬ 
tration of voters,” said another. “If there’s no party or¬ 
ganization there’s no interest and it’s easier for those who 
are inclined to mischief to make trouble. Out in the country 
to-day the only opposition to a lot of illegal votes from new¬ 
comers is the Big Jim clubs. There would have been hun¬ 
dreds, perhaps thousands, of illegal votes if they hadn’t 
happened to be on duty.” 

“It seems very plain to me,” said Jim, “that this system is 
lame and halt and blind. My own opinion is that we should 
have ability in office. There’s no man so dangerous in all the 
world in office, especially in big office, as the honest, igno¬ 
rant blunderer except the dishonest, ignorant blunderer, and 
this direct primary system favors both these specimens. It 
also seems to favor exactly the kind of official that the 
average citizen doesn’t want to elevate to any office, big or 
little.” 

“There’s the minority boss now, Lew Delker,” said one of 
the men. “He’s driving down the street like a whirlwind; 
exceeding the speed limit three to one. He was drunk early 
this morning and he’s drunk now. He can drive at that 
rate on the streets and no officer will say a word to him. No 
one else could do that. They say he has bought blocks of 
realty in the last few weeks, paid immense sums for them, 
nearly all in the lower part of the city, and a little while ago 
he was an ordinary clerk.” 

Jim and Mary went home and ’phoned to the family friends 
and Reverend Story to come over. They all had supper to¬ 
gether. Returns from the election began to come in early. 


3 §9 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

Congratulations poured in on Jim by ’phone. He was 
clearly nominated. 

Later Montague called up. “Congratulations, Jim, for 
yourself; you’re elected sure but we’ve got it divided up. 
Whiskey beat some of our people. They were too well or¬ 
ganized for us. The present prosecutor is nominated again 
on our ticket. Delker supported him. You know what that 
means. Good-night and good wishes!” 

The ’phone rang again. “This is Reyland speaking. We 
three on the committee are here at club headquarters. You 
are nominated by a big vote. We pledge you the help of the 
clubs till you’re elected at the coming election.” 

The family party broke up a little later than usual and 
soon all the houses around, including Jim’s, was dark. The 
primary election was over. 

Jim pursued the same policy he had been following. He 
left the political work for the clubs. The time passed swiftly 
till election day came on. It was a repetition of the primary. 
The clubs carried Jim through at the head of the polls. 
Congratulations again poured in from all sides. “We have 
kept our pledge; we congratulate you,” said Caledon over 
the ’phone, speaking for the clubs. 

Jim scanned the ticket elected. “As near as I can make out 
they’ve got a prosecutor who is favorable to them and at least 
one of the county commissioners. They’re the officers in 
whom I am most interested,” he said to Mary. “It looks 
like hard sledding but we’re on the road, anyway.” 

The next month was spent in getting ready to move to the 
city and in moving. Jim rented a cottage near the court 
house and on the last day of the year he and Mary were at 
home there. He took possession of the sheriff’s office at 
nine o’clock on January first without any formality. The 
deputies he was allowed he chose from among the many 
applicants himself: one city man for his city experience and 
knowledge and two young fellows from the country. 

He had a confidential talk with them and told them what he 
wanted. “We have enough routine work here serving papers 


39 o BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

and such like to keep us busy but we’ll have to work overtime 
and all work together. Hours will not be considered by us. 
It’s up to us to put down this whiskey traffic in the northwest. 
The first thing we want is evidence. We want to know who 
brings it in, by what routes, to whom it is delivered, who sells 
it, who is behind each part of the traffic. We can find out and 
each fellow has a special commission to go ahead and sleuth. 
Get evidence, and get real evidence, something that will hold 
in court. We’ll work together on it. It can’t be done by any 
one man. Outline a general plan and go to it all as one man. 

“Be cautious in making arrests but not too cautious. 
Where there’s no emergency go slow. We have guns here. 
I’ve never owned a revolver but they’re a necessity here. 
The criminals all have them. We’ll organize a little target 
practice gang of our own and learn to shoot. Here’s my 
theory, that an officer should always be able to shoot so 
accurately that usually he wouldn’t need to kill a man. 
Seven times out of ten a dangerous criminal could be shot 
through the arm or leg and disarmed and handcuffed instead 
of being killed if the officer has had special revolver practice. 
We’ll begin that this evening and keep it up steady. We’ll go 
out behind the old dump. It’s a ravine where no one goes and 
we’ll practise in secret. Now keep your eyes open on the 
whiskey. What thousands of people know we can find out. 
Make notes. Don’t trust to your memory.” 

Montague called in during the forenoon. “How’s the lay 
of the land?” he said when he and Jim were left alone in 
Jim’s office. 

“Not favorable,” said Jim. “I’ve been finding out a lot. 
The sheriff works through the prosecutor. Every bit of 
evidence I get against whiskey is placed in the hands of the 
prosecutor to handle. Our prosecutor is controlled by Delker. 
I know that because Delker nominated him and elected 
him. The prosecutor can sidetrack every case I put up to 
him and keep our enemies fully informed and still stay within 
the legal bounds of his official duty. That’s what their plan 
is and the gang is laughing and joking about the situation. 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 391 

We must have a special whiskey prosecutor who will act in¬ 
dependently of the county attorney.” 

“I don’t see how it could be done,” said Montague. “He 
would have to act under the name and authority of the county 
attorney for he’s the official head of all prosecutions.” 

“How’s your friend Madison, the county commissioner? 
He’s your neighbor,” asked Jim. 

“With us heart and soul, as true as steel.” 

“How’s Commissioner Malarty?” 

“Couldn’t say for sure till he’s tried. I think he’ll work 
with us.” 

“How’s Dunmore?” 

“Dead against us, Delker elected him also.” 

“Would Madison find out about Malarty for you?” 

“Sure, I’ll talk with him right away, he can find out in a 
short time.” 

“Good,” said Jim; “get after him and be sure that he’s not 
guessing when he arrives at an opinion. Everything'depends 
on Malarty.” 

“Here’s my program if Malarty is with us for sure. The 
prosecutor is asking for help. It’s up to the commissioners to 
grant him a deputy for they have to pay the deputy. If we 
have Madison and Malarty they can say to him when he 
comes before them: ‘Yes, we’ll appoint Victor Delmont 
deputy and pay him and his business will be to attend to the 
legal needs of us commissioners and the other county officers. 
That will be a special work. Such other time as he has will 
be devoted to such work as the prosecutor wishes done.’ He 
will be suspicious of this and won’t want Delmont probably, 
but what can he do? He can’t fight the commissioners on 
his own proposition, can he? Delmont can be appointed at 
once and go to work in the prosecutor’s office openly and ad¬ 
vise us secretly in our emergencies. That will be his business 
and it won’t be double crossing anyone. 

“When we get our net spread Delmont will be in the saddle 
and the first big swoop we make may put the enemy out of 
business. I’m going to combine with the United States cus- 


392 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

toms and the Federal Enforcement officials. Tve talked 
with them already. If more obstacles arise in my path, put 
there by the prosecutor or any other official, I’m going to get 
all the evidence together and go straight to the superior judge 
or even the governor. No subaltern officer like this tool of 
Delker’s is going to nullify the laws while I’m here. You see 
Madison and have him talk at once with Malarty. We want 
Malarty to act with us because he’s with us naturally. We 
probably can force him to do so but we don’t want to do that.” 

“I’ll do it,” said Montague earnestly. “I’ll know by to¬ 
morrow. We’ll have a distinct understanding.” 

The next morning the deputies had a mass of evidence all 
tabulated and outlined in different cases. “All trails lead 
to Delker,” said the city deputy. “Every case we have 
leads back to him but it’s hard to get legal liability on him. 
I’m amazed at the size and power of this whiskey ring.” 

Montague came in. “It’s all right, Jim. Malarty is 
stiffer necked than any of us on the whiskey question but he 
doesn’t say much on any subject. He always thinks first and 
talks afterward. As soon as the subject was broached he 
came out flat footed in favor of law enforcement and he’s 
the warmest kind of a friend of Delmont’s. It seems when 
Delmont was a kid he taught school for a term or two and 
Malarty’s family was in his school. It’s a case of a whole 
family friendship and that makes it all the stronger. I 
didn’t outline your plan to Madison. I only tried to find out 
two things for sure: Malarty’s personal whiskey attitude and 
his attitude toward Delmont.” 

“Good,” said Jim. “We’ll call them right in here and have 
it out. I’ll plump the plan right out, shirt-sleeve diplomacy 
it will be, but I’m not going to beat about the bush in the least. 
You get them in here without Dunmore knowing it.” 

The commissioners came in and Jim outlined his plan, giv¬ 
ing his reasons for it in detail. 

“I’m with you,” said Malarty. 

“So am I,” said Madison. “I think your choice of Del¬ 
mont is a good one. Of course the prosecutor will want to 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 393 

pick his own man but he can’t object very well to Delmont. 
He’s to come before us to-morrow morning and ask for an¬ 
other deputy and explain why he needs him. Weil adopt your 
plan in answering him. We need a lawyer to help us with 
advice frequently when the prosecutor is busy.” 

“And we control the situation,” said Malarty grimly. 
“Madison and myself understand it pretty thoroughly.” 

“It’s going to work,” said Montague after the commis¬ 
sioners had gone. “Those two men are in dead earnest and 
if we get Delmont in here we’ll sweep this whole northwest 
with a whiskey vacuum cleaner and clear up a whole lot of 
other criminality besides.” 

“Well, it’s all done,” he said the next morning as he came 
into Jim’s office with a broad smile on his face. “The prose¬ 
cutor was in the commissioners’ office and made his request. 
Very quietly Malarty acquiesced and went on to explain how 
their office so frequently needed legal advice informally. 
Madison also thought so. Dunmore, of course, thought so, 
too. He and the prosecutor evidently had prepared for a 
fight and were surprised. Then Malarty innocently asked if 
another deputy were appointed if he could be made the special 
formal and also the informal adviser of the county officials so 
that they would have at all times a man to whom they could 
go when they needed advice. The prosecutor agreed to that 
seemingly very gladly. Sure thing the new deputy would 
have that for his special job and could do other official work 
when not so engaged. This was his own suggestion. 

“Then Malarty recommended Delmont warmly and moved 
he be appointed. Madison also recommended Delmont and 
seconded the motion. 

“You should have seen the prosecutor and Dunmore. 
Both got red in the face. They were caught. Neither of 
them dare quarrel with a majority of the board and they 
couldn’t find any serious objection to Delmont. They tried 
to stave it off but that man Malarty is a steel-trap sort of a 
genius. He closed the discussion with an emphatic remark 
that Delmont was elected to begin his duties to-morrow morn- 


394 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

ing and called for the next order of business. It was a Water** 
loo. The enemy collapsed.” 

“I see the beginning of the end,” said Jim. “The evidence 
is piling up here in basketfuls. We can indict a houseful of 
people but we’ll go slow and make a sure sweep. One of these 
nights I’ll need an army of deputies.” 

“Just let me know when that night comes. I want to be 
in on the cleanup. I’ve got a hundred neighbors who would 
like to take their pitch forks and be there, too.” 

Jim and his deputies were working night and day. They 
found their regular duties were enough to keep them busy and 
the whiskey work was piled on top of that. A good deal of 
the liquor detective work had to be done after night. The 
entire force was enthusiastic and joined hands in their sleuth 
efforts. They were piling up results that could be seen so 
they rather enjoyed the long hours. 

The next forenoon Madison, Malarty, Montague, and Del- 
mont, the newly employed deputy attorney, came in. “Well, 
we have it all arranged,” said Madison. “We had the prose¬ 
cutor and one of the judges down in our office and talked over 
Delmont’s appointment and he is to be special deputy for the 
county officers and when there’s nothing in that line he does 
general work. We had him clear up a point for us this 
morning that has saved us a lot of trouble. We have all 
come in to have a friendly confab just among ourselves. 
Now will you explain the whole situation to Delmont as we 
have only given him a hint.” 

Jim started at the beginning and went over the whole 
ground. 

“Now that’s really what you’re here for,” said Malarty. 
“We don’t need a deputy particularly nor do any of the other 
officers but the sheriff does; and he needs him bad. Here’s 
where you’ll find your work and we all trust to you instead 
of to the prosecutor and you’ll find lots of things here that 
should never go into the prosecutor’s hands.” 

“I see,” said Delmont. “It may be that I’ll be in a pretty 
difficult situation before long between the prosecutor’s office 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 395 

and the sheriff’s, but at the present time the road is clear and 
I’ll cross bridges when I come to them.” 

“Here’s a batch of cases,” said Jim, “that I turn over to 
the prosecutor’s office with the evidence all tabulated. 
There’s no objection to the prosecutor getting these and think¬ 
ing they’re all there is. We can’t be hurt in these cases by 
anything he does in giving out information or otherwise and 
it will be a blind for us to work behind. This other bundle 
here is for us and us alone. They are the important cases 
leading right up to Delker and his headquarters and we can’t 
afford to jeopardize them. You can call and take them 
home with you or you can have my private office for your 
special work for us. I’ll give you a desk for yourself.” 

“All right,” said Delmont, “this first bunch are my official 
work, anything else you have here like this last bunch will be 
extra official and I’ll look at it later after office hours and 
whatever I have to say about these extra official cases will be 
as a friend not in my official capacity. I believe I understand 
the situation exactly.” 

That night there was a conference in Delker’s office and he 
and one of his confidential workers remained smoking after 
the others had gone. “How’s the new sheriff acting?” 
Delker’s friend asked. “Has he discovered any serious in¬ 
fringement of the liquor law yet?” 

Delker smiled. “Yes, he has found six or eight cases to 
prosecute and has put them up to the prosecutor. None of 
them will hurt us and I told Bob to go ahead and prosecute 
every one of them vigorously. The more fuss he makes about 
them the better it will be for all of us. Big Jim hasn’t found a 
single case that affects us. I guess Bob will look after him 
and keep him in bounds. He’s not going to injure our trade 
any if he follows his present practice.” 

“What about the new deputy?” 

“Not at all friendly but as long as he’s working under Bob 
he’s entirely harmless. We’re keeping tab on his kind of 
people.” 

A few days after word came through the deputies of hints 


396 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

of a big shipment to come in later. One deputy heard it up 
north; another heard it in the city. Rumors were in the air 
for days. Then one of the deputies got it definitely that it 
was to come down the middle of the next week from British 
Columbia; part by boat and part by auto. 

“Another thing/’ said the deputy to Jim, “you are being 
carefully watched. There’s a man picks you up in the 
morning as soon as you start out from the house and you’re 
followed all day till you go to bed. About the time of this 
big shipment they’ll probably double that watch.” 

“I’ve noticed a man hanging round but I never knew what 
it meant before,” said Jim. “I’ll fix him in some way when 
the time comes.” 

Later two of the deputies, working from different clews, 
brought in the information that the big shipment was to 
come down on Friday, a week ahead. Jim studied the situa¬ 
tion and calling in Madison and Malarty told them all he knew 
and asked their sanction to swearing in at least twenty special 
deputies and also for whatever extra auto expense there might 
be. They gave it readily and said they would make their 
action official as soon as the event was over. 

Jim then called Montague, who was now stopping in town, 
and asked him to get twenty fellows from out in his section 
of the country to get ready to act as deputies. They were to 
keep perfectly quiet about the matter; to move only in autos 
with curtains drawn if they came in a crowd and to arm them¬ 
selves; especially with double-barreled shotguns loaded with 
buckshot. “They may have to shoot tires to pieces and 
there’s nothing surer than a double-barreled shotgun,” said 
Jim. “It is a bold man who will look into one of them and 
defy it. Many a criminal will take a chance against a re¬ 
volver but none of them will risk a load of buckshot mussing 
him up. Even as a bluff the shotgun is a success. I know 
the waterfront thoroughly but will look it over again. You 
make a study of it by yourself and pick out the places where 
launches are most likely to unload. I’ll deputize you right 
now to work with us till after this shipment comes in. The 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 397 

main thing is not to let them know that we know. We’ll go 
ahead with our regular work as usual and you can do your 
work under cover. 

“I’ll fix up another batch of camouflage cases for Del- 
mont so they’ll think we’re busy on them. After this when 
I call you up or you call me up we’ll talk about some unim¬ 
portant matter before you come to the office. Among the 
men you pick up we want two or three linemen who will 
bring along their climbing irons and telephone wire-tapping 
apparatus. We will probably want to cut in on the tele¬ 
phone wire out in the woods. You can get a couple of these 
fellows from a distance if you can’t pick up men you know. 
I’m getting such a complete case against two dozen of these 
big city places that we’ll try and pull off the whole thing at 
the same time. If we can capture this big shipment we’ll file 
charges and evidence right then against these city places and 
make a noise that’ll be heard at any rate.” 

The office force worked for days under tension. On the sur¬ 
face they were doing their routine work but arrangements 
were also being perfected for the big event. Jim saw the 
customs collector and made arrangements for strange customs 
officers to go with them. He saw the head of the Federal 
Dry Enforcement Force and got help from them. By twos 
and threes there drifted into the city young men from the 
country who posed as witnesses in various cases and who 
dropped into the sheriff’s office now and then on their way to 
and from the court house. It was Montague’s squad. 

‘‘What’s that wire running down there for?” asked one of 
them one day. He was one of Montague’s linemen and he 
pointed to a concealed wire running down to the floor and 
along the edge of the floor under the linoleum behind Jim’s 
desk. “ I just happened to see a glint of it here and there and 
it didn’t look natural,” said the lineman. Jim looked curi¬ 
ously. There was the wire running into the room above and 
along the floor. It could be seen if a person took the trouble 
to follow it up. 

“If I’m not mistaken it’s a plan to put a dictograph in 


398 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

here,” said the lineman, as he looked behind the desk. “The 
machine isn’t in yet. Now you just keep quiet and look 
around your desk to-morrow morning. Who’s in the room 
above ?” 

“That’s a rear room of the prosecutor’s office. You go up 
there and get a look inside that rear room if you can. I’ll put 
a man to watch when the prosecutor goes out. Then I’ll have 
his stenographer called to the commissioners’ office and you 
can walk right in and look around quickly. If you’re seen 
you’re only looking for a friend of yours who is a witness 
and was to go to the prosecutor’s office on some business. 
Montague will go with you and sort of act as lookout while 
you go inside.” 

The scheme worked. “It’s a plant all right,” said the line¬ 
man as he came back in a few minutes. “The front room is a 
general office. There are two rooms back of it. One is the 
prosecutor’s private office and the other is the stenographer’s 
office. In the corner of it is a very large clothes closet. 
That’s where this wire runs to. All that’s needed for this 
wire to be equipped at both ends is a stenographer at the 
upper end with a head piece ’phone receiver and a dictograph 
at this end. Then every word spoken here, even in a whis¬ 
per, is written down up there and you know where it goes. 
That thing will be completed to-night or I miss my guess.” 

Jim laughed. “Just leave that alone,” he said. “We’ll 
give them some fancy reports to turn in. We’ll now cover 
it up completely, as the expert who put this wire in should 
have done, and wait. I guess he must have been in an awful 
hurry. I begin to see how we must guard papers here as well 
as our talk. This is one time that the fooler will be fooled. 
The trap’s going to catch the trapper and I hope it will snap 
good and hard and hold tight. I sort of admire the tremen¬ 
dous resourceful influence of this whiskey traffic management. 
If the same bunch of fellows would exert the same powerful 
influence in a beneficial direction they would become the 
world savers; heroes of benevolence and altruism. It’s a 
grand perversion when Satan can enlist such zealots in his 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 399 

service and get such zealous devotion to his interests. Luck 
is on our side or we’d have lost our results in the big under¬ 
taking. You folks drop in casually about ten in the morning 
and we’ll see what we see then. I’ll put our deputies wise to 
the contraption but no one else is to know. If it’s in place 
I’ll be here early in the morning. I’ll use the jailer’s wood¬ 
shed two doors up the hall for my confidential talks, and this 
office will be used only for routine business and such con¬ 
fidences as I wish to give my friend Delker and his cabinet. 
I’ll confide all secrets to them all right.” 

The next morning Montague and the two linemen came in. 
“Good morning, boys,” Jim said before they got a chance to 
speak. “I’m glad you boys came in. I want to give you a 
subpoena each in that Erickson case. Just wait a minute 
till I fill them out. How’s things out in the country?” 
While he was talking he was waving his hand toward the wire 
and pointed underneath the desk. Montague made some 
unimportant remark while he and the linemen looked. There, 
sure enough, close to the floor, screwed to the desk in the dark¬ 
ness where Jim’s feet usually were stretched, was a small 
cylinder-like object. The wire was attached to it. A grin 
was on every face. 

Jim scrawled on a piece of paper: “Ask me how about the 
whiskey business?” and held it up before Montague. “How 
are you and the liquor fellows making it, Mr. Sheriff? Are 
you going to get some of the bootleggers?” said he. 

“Oh, yes, we’ve closed in on a lot of them; have twenty-odd 
cases pending in court. The prosecutor’s pretty busy these 
days but as quick as he can get to them they’ll be all brought 
to feel the weight of the law. We’ll wipe it all out in time. 
This office won’t have hardly any time to devote to it now till 
the first of next month because this tax business is making us 
so much extra work. I doubt if they’re pulling off any big 
stunts just now, anyway. I expect by the tenth we’ll have 
some extra time and will dig in harder. Now if you boys 
will come with me to the auditor’s office I’ll help you get these 
papers fixed up.” 


4 oo BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

They went out in the hallway and turned into the wood¬ 
shed, a small room near by that was vacant except that the 
deputies were in it comparing notes. “ We’re going to use my 
office for just that kind of talk till after the raid and use this 
for our confidential office. There’s a window here and we can 
ventilate this and still be comfortable. About the time we 
make the big raid I’m going to expose that plant but we’ll use 
it for our own purposes in the meantime. I’ll keep their 
stenographer busy taking notes of just the stuff I want them 
to believe and act on. I have a hard time keeping some of 
our crowd from giving us away but I meet them in the outer 
office and engineer them into the hall to do their talking. 
Only our few people know of the trap and it mustn’t go be¬ 
yond that few.” 

The days went by till Friday came. All the arrangements 
were made as nearly perfect as they could be covering such 
a wide scope. The city deputy had charge of the waterfront 
work in the coming battle. Along with him were his own 
men and part of the Federal force and one customs officer. 
The rest of the Federal squad and two customs officers were 
to go with Jim, who was going to take charge of the land 
troubles himself. His band was to patrol the leading roads. 
A lineman was to be with a few scouts near the international 
line close to a ’phone station. If they saw anything worth 
reporting the lineman was to get on the wire and by means of 
a code notify another lineman who had cut in on the wire near 
the main rendezvous. Other scouts took their places along 
the supposed routes of the bootleggers and were to speed down 
and report if any information came to them. The bootleg¬ 
gers would probably carry no lights; the deputies would. Jim’s 
force had been out locating themselves for two days so as not 
to arouse suspicion by group movements. Each one had 
some business out where he was. They were to meet at 
dusk on Friday at a certain place. It was well known that 
the bootleggers would travel in bunches, the first auto in 
their caravan being a pilot who carried no whiskey but was to 
see that the way was clear. 


401 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

Jim used a ruse to deceive the whiskey detective that was 
on duty watching him. The fellow was posted at the next 
corner to Jim’s house. When Jim’s day’s work was done on 
Friday he got in his machine and started out past where the 
detective was watching. When he got started Mary came out 
with his overcoat and called him. He stopped near where 
the detective was standing half concealed by a telephone pole. 
Mary came up and gave him the coat. “Now be sure and 
be back in half an hour,” she said loudly to him as he started. 

“Sure,” he answered. “Leave the gate open so I can drive 
in.” It was then near dark. In half an hour he returned 
past the detective, with a woman riding beside him, his great 
coat up round his ears, and drove into the garage with the 
machine and went into the house. 

But it wasn’t Jim. Jim at that moment was away out north 
in the country conferring with his people in the thick woods. 
The tall figure in the great coat was young David Henderson, 
one of Jim’s neighbor boys out at the farm and the woman was 
David’s mother. He was over six feet and Jim had made 
arrangements with him to do this very thing. The detective 
reported to his relief who came on at nine o’clock that Jim 
was inside and the other man watched the house as usual till 
morning. 

The arrangements Jim made were that they were to be 
stopped on the long curve of the road in a dense woods. The 
main body of his men were placed at the extreme south end of 
this curve. Two men were some distance back and two more 
farther back and two more at the bend of the curve. These 
last two could see everything both ways. The orders were 
for the two men near the middle of the curve to allow the 
autos to come through but none to return. If anyone turned 
around blow his radiator and his tires to pieces with buckshot 
first thing and if that didn’t stop him then stop him some 
way; without killing anyone if possible. Riddling his gasoline 
tank would surely stop him in a short distance. It might 
burn the auto, but accidents are bound to happen and this 
was no child’s play, anyway. 


402 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

Jim and the main body of his men placed three logs across 
the road at a place where an autoist couldn’t see them at a 
great distance. Over the center of these logs was a big 
painted sign: “Officers.” “Stop.” An electric headlight 
with batteries attached was made ready to spotlight this sign 
and the logs so that any autoist couldn’t make the mistake of 
either running blindly into the logs or thinking he was a vic¬ 
tim of a holdup. 

To his force Jim said: “Keep out of sight. We may be up 
against hop heads armed with high-powered automatics. 
They may shoot if they see anyone in the excitement. In 
fact, they’re pretty sure to do so. Everybody keep out of sight 
till it’s necessary to come out. We don’t want any of our 
people shot. Be cautious. We’ll get better results. But 
don’t let anyone escape. We’ll be on both sides of the road 
and any fellow making a break will run into some of us. 
We’ve all got flashlights. If you have to fight get in the first 
blow. If trouble arises every man keep his own station as 
much as possible so that all the rest of our people will know 
who he is by his position. Every fellow pin a big bunch of 
this black gauze on his chest and back. I’d have got white 
stuff only it would be too conspicuous. Our flashlights will 
show these black bunches and identify us. When a man 
moves from his position or is moving round our password is 
‘Dope.’ Say that as low or yell it as loud as the circum¬ 
stances require. Every fellow keep cool and use common 
sense, just common sense, that’s all any officer needs at any 
time to keep him out of trouble and keep within his responsi¬ 
bilities. Common sense is an officer’s unwritten law; al¬ 
ways has been and always will be. It’s his constitution and 
his bylaws. 

“Now three of you take positions on either side opposite the 
logs. The headlight man stand behind that tree. We’ll put 
the headlight right by his hand so that he can operate it from 
behind the tree. The remainder line up as far as that other 
tree. Now the fellows near the end look out for an auto may 
turn out at fifty miles an hour to get by through the woods. 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 403 

And everybody be careful. If you have to shoot keep your 
heads and remember where our own men are. Don’t let us 
go back to town carrying someone wounded or killed by our 
own guns.” 

The lineman cut in on the telephone wires and everyone took 
his place and waited. The men sat on logs and walked about 
and talked in low tones. Smoking was forbidden unless the 
smoker lit his cigar or his pipe where the light couldn’t 
possibly be seen and held it in some hole where no light 
showed. The striking of even one match at the inopportune 
moment might ruin all the plans. The flare of a match could 
be seen a long distance on a dark night and the bootleggers 
were bound to be suspicious. It was a tedious wait. At 
twelve-thirty the lineman whispered; “I’ve got our signal.” 
In a moment he announced: “I understood the code per¬ 
fectly. He gave a message to the city from the station on 
the border on the international line. It was a harmless 
message if outsiders read it but I understood at once. He 
says to us that a big bunch of autos are headed down the road. 
They’re passing him now. I broke in with just one word after 
he had finished giving the message to the operator in the city 
to show him that I had got his message and understood it. 
If I hadn’t got it I’d have used a different word and he’d have 
repeated his message, but my word told him that I had it. 
The city operator thought it was him speaking when I spoke 
that way and asked what that was he said. He told her he 
was telling the dog to get out of the house so she never caught 
on.” 

A guard darted up each side of the road and told the good 
news. The men sprang to position. It was bound to be 
some time before the convoy got there but the tension was too 
great to resist. In a little while the lookout at the curve 
threw his flashlight down the road one flash and then two 
winks of the light. It said to the group below at the logs: 
“One auto coming with two lights.” 

Everybody sought cover. The auto whizzed around the 
top of the curve like an angry comet, its headlights illumin- 


4 o4 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

mg away back in the forest as it came to the bend from the 
left and turned back again from the curve to the right. It 
was surely a racing machine in high gear. In an instant it was 
down close to the logs; the engine humming and singing the 
song of the super six at its highest speed. The driver saw 
the logs in the center of the road and at the same instant the 
big sign lit up, like a million-dollar theater electric sign on 
Broadway. The driver didn’t hesitate. The sign could be 
read instantly and he had time to brake his car but he didn’t. 
It was a trap. He would take a chance. He swung off the 
road. He might get by in the ditch. What he did he did 
almost intuitively and without any figuring. He made his 
resolve in the twentieth of a second. He opened his throttle 
wide and hit one of the side logs near the outer end. The 
log gave way at the terrific impact but the end caught in a 
bank of mud along the ditch. 

The log broke squarely off in the center and the ends slewed 
around at right angles, leaving an open roadway in the ditch 
but it had done its guardian duty faithfully. The auto didn’t 
go through the opening. A front wheel was torn off, the 
tire was torn off the other wheel, the auto bounded like a 
rubber ball twenty feet away into the woods, tore through 
some saplings and mowed them down, struck a big fir tree 
a glancing blow, took the bark off it up to eight feet from the 
ground, flopped heels over head twice and lay there bottom 
side up with a dead engine. Three men were pitched far out 
in different directions when it took its first gymnast plunge 
away from the log. Several rifles also flew in different direc¬ 
tions at the same time. A fourth man, the driver, was 
thrown out to one side when the machine struck the tree. 
A dozen shotguns were raised to fusillade the machine if it 
got through but no one had time to pull a trigger. 

Jim said just loud enough for his men to hear: ‘‘Keep your 
flashlights turned south; don’t show them northward. Two 
men look after that machine. This right-hand bunch fix the 
log in place. There’s another coming.” 

Two men sprang after the escaping auto that didn’t escape 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 405 

and examined the men thrown out. Not one of them moved. 
They were left lying where they fell. They took a look at 
the machine. It was harmless also. They returned to their 
stations. The dead men would keep if they were dead. If 
only stunned they would keep anyway. Four other men 
sprang out and rearranged the log. Another machine strik¬ 
ing it the same way might go through but there was no time 
to fortify further. 

Again there was a flash from the bend in the curve, a flash 
to the south. It meant another auto without lights. It 
could be heard but not seen. It did not sing and hum like 
the first auto. It was a different make. Its noise was a low, 
constant roar and it told of high power and finely finished 
engine and tornado speed. 

Again the big sign lit up on the center log. The driver 
of this machine ground his brakes against the wheels and 
slid. He veered a little to the left. His auto half turned 
around, struck the center and left logs where they joined 
and toppled clear over them and lay on its side, the engine 
still running. The driver scrambled out. There was a crash 
of broken bottles as the machine went over and the aroma 
of alcohol filled the air up and down the road. Whiskey, 
brandy, gin, wine, whatever it was, it was strong-scented 
stuff and evidently there was a Kentucky cellar full in that 
auto. 

“Arrest him, leave the auto where it is,” said Jim quietly, 
and an officer sprang out with shotgun aimed and ordered 
the driver to hold up his hands. He seemed dazed but not 
too dazed to obey that shotgun command and the officer 
walked him to the ditch, snapped the handcuffs on his hands 
behind his back, and led him to Jim. Jim examined him all 
over with his flashlight. The arresting officer expertly 
searched him and brought out two guns from his pocket. 

“How many machines are there coming behind you?” 
asked Jim sternly as he towered over the prisoner and played 
his flashlight below his eyes just far enough so he was not 
blinded and yet a good view could be got of his expression. 


4 o6 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

"I don’t know, a dozen or more. I didn’t have a chance to 
see all of them. They’re coming close behind.” 

"All loaded?” 

“Yes.” 

"Who’s in charge?” 

"Lew Delker.” 

"Is it his whiskey?” 

"Yes.” 

"Is he along?” 

"Yes, one of the drivers got hurt and he took the auto just 
behind me. It’s a big Cadillac.” 

"Any other proprietors along?” 

"No, just Delker. All the rest of us are hired drivers.” 

"Tie this man’s legs to that small tree and let him sit back 
there on the log. Be sure of your knots. There’s a long coil 
of rope by that stump,” said Jim. 

Another flash to the south came from the bend above. It 
heralded an auto without lights. The same sound came down 
the road. A high-powered machine, running furiously with¬ 
out lights, came rushing at the logs like some insane monster. 
The spotlight again illumined that great glaring sign that 
told so much in so few words; the law of the United States 
booming out its one imperious command to the man who had 
learned by immunity to despise the law of the United States. 
Lew Delker saw the sign and the logs as the others did and he 
also struck his brakes as hard as he could and slid his ma¬ 
chine along the asphalt, hitting just where the last machine 
did and in the same way, his auto going half over, striking 
heavily with a thirty-two-hundred-pound force against the 
other one. Again there was a sound of clashing bottles and 
another great wave of alcoholic aroma was wafted back and 
forth far out into the night. Delker was not thrown out. 
He slowly clambered out of his cramped position. 

"Arrest him. Four men on that side shove the auto on 
down across the ditch. We’ll make a barricade of autos,” 
said Jim from the darkness. 

Another officer jumped out with aimed shotgun. "Throw 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 407 

up your hands.” Delker did so. The officer marched him 
through the ditch, snapped the cuffs on his hands behind his 
back, and led him to Jim. Jim threw the flashlight over him 
while the officer searched him and pulled two revolvers from 
his pockets. 

“So, you’ve run your race,” said Jim grimly. 

Delker was half drunk. The odor of whiskey was all over 
him. The shock had sobered him some but he realized his 
predicament and he grew wild with rage. “Yes,” he swore, 
“ and I’ll run some more. I’ll sell more whiskey to-morrow in 
the city than I’ve sold any day in the year. I’ll show you 
who’s going to run the whiskey business in spite of your traps. 
I’ll-” he sputtered for words and could say no more. 

“You’ll do nothing of the kind. You’ll go back there to 
that log with the other criminals and have your feet tied to 
that tree just like them and from this on you’ll be treated by 
us as a common or rather as an uncommon criminal. You’re 
not defying me, Lew Delker, you’re defying the law of 
the land and it’s the law of the land is speaking to you now. 
Tie this criminal up with the rest of the criminal gang and 
make the knots in your rope tight,” said Jim. The officer 
led him back and tied his legs to the tree the same as he 
had the other driver. Delker was at a point where he could 
look through the branches and see the fate of the rest of the 
caravan. 

One after another they came and slammed up against the 
barricade of logs and autos that had formed. Jim’s men had 
a hard time keeping the sign and pathway for the spotlight 
clear. Twice two machines came thundering down so close 
together that the first one couldn’t be got out of the road be¬ 
fore the second roared down on it. There were half-a-dozen 
hard collisions and much broken bottleware and much spilled 
liquor. 

“Tie these fellows by twos in different places so they can’t 
talk with each other,” was Jim’s command, and the drivers 
were marched in different directions and tied to small trees, 
each one with his hands handcuffed behind his back. As a 


4 o8 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

rule the autos were from five to ten minutes behind each 
other and at the end of an hour they had nine machines 
stacked around in the ditches. 

“ Montague, take your men and go round and find out how 
many more are coming,” said Jim. “There’s eleven alto¬ 
gether, two more to come. We found that out from four 
different groups of drivers. They all agreed. Delker admits 
it. He says we’ll get them anyway and there’s no use lying 
about a little thing like that,” reported Montague. 

Another flash at the bend and then another immediately 
following showed two autos coming. The first one came 
down according to schedule as the others had but the last one 
was just far enough behind so that he saw the trap his com¬ 
rade had got into. He ground his brakes against the wheels, 
slid along sideways, stopped, and whirled half around to make 
a run for it. A load of buckshot tore his radiator to pieces, 
another took a tire off a front wheel, and another tore through 
behind him and threw pieces of broken bottles and spurts of 
whiskey all over him. He was half drunk but that fusillade 
sobered him up. He leaped from the auto and darted into 
the brush. He just reached the edge of the road when a 
mighty fist, the fist of McKeever, Montague’s neighbor from 
away out in the country to the southeast, struck him on the jaw. 
He came to a half hour later, with handcuffs on his hands 
behind his back, lying in an auto truck headed for the city. 
The automobile he was driving was run into the ditch where 
it stood. That was the reported end of the caravan but Jim 
waited another hour to make sure. 

“See that the prisoners do not get a chance to talk to¬ 
gether,” was Jim’s first orders. “Montague, you circulate 
around on one side and find out all you can about where this 
whiskey came from and where it’s going and who owns it and 
everything else you can and I’ll do the same on this side of 
the road. Two of the men up the road remain on guard 
there at the bend. Be careful of autos coming with lights. 
There may be lawful travelers any time. Two men guard the 
prisoners on each side, patrolling between the bunches. 





BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 409 

The rest of the men straighten out these autos and start 
them,” ordered Jim. 

“We need all the auto mechanics we can get. We’ve only 
two with us,” said one of the officers. “Go round and see 
how many drivers will volunteer. I expect nearly all of these 
fellows are skilled mechanics.” 

“There’s five volunteers,” was the report. 

“Bring them in under guard and put them at work under 
guard.” 

The drivers were soon at work and as they were skilled men 
all the autos but three were soon standing in the road with 
engines humming, although most of them were broken and 
damaged in non-essential parts. 

“Can’t get any information of value about this whiskey. 
The drivers say they’re just hired men; that Delker’s the only 
man that knows,” reported Montague. 

“That’s just what I found out and Delker won’t talk,” said 
Jim. 

In another hour Jim gave the command to pick up the in¬ 
jured men and put them on the bed of a one-ton truck he had 
brought out with him for that very purpose. It had a plat¬ 
form body. “The two men on guard at the bend will stay 
here till relieved in the morning and guard the debris here in 
the road. The drivers will be freed and two men will go in 
each machine to the jail yard where the two guards in the 
front machine will stay on duty till relieved in the morning 
and guard the cargoes. The prisoners are ordered not to talk 
to each other and the guards will see that they do not. They 
will be put in separate cells and locked up. No bail allowed 
till after nine in the morning and no communication with 
friends till then. You gentlemen of the Federal Dry squad 
and United States customs are invited to come to my office in 
the morning at nine and we’ll divide the cases up in whatever 
way is lawful. You are invited to come with me now to the 
waterfront to see how the criminals fare there. We’ll travel 
ahead of the procession so as to be on hand there as soon as 
possible,” said Jim. 


4 io 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

They arrived at the waterfront just as the city deputy was 
leaving with prisoners for the county jail. “We’ve got two 
launches,” he explained, “one big one and one little one. A 
third came in and tied up. We got two men aboard to take 
possession of her and arrest the crew. The engineer had 
steam up and suddenly backed up with a tremendous lurch 
and broke the rope that tied him to the wharf. One of our 
men was thrown from the deck into the bay and the other 
seized a loose plank on the deck and jumped in after him to 
rescue him. He brought him out on the plank but the launch 
got away. We have guards on the two launches we held. 
They came in at different places on the waterfront. These 
prisoners are the crews and two men, who evidently came 
down to meet the launches, and were picked up on suspicion. 
The launches were loaded with contraband whiskey.” 

“We’ll probably turn them over to the customs in the morn¬ 
ing,” said Jim, and he repeated his orders about the prisoners 
being kept separate till morning so that they might not talk 
together. 

“Now, gentlemen of the customs and Federal squad, we will 
take charge of everything till morning. To-morrow forenoon 
when we get this mixture separated into its component parts 
and find out which is which we’ll turn over each department’s 
share to it. Whichever department can handle any part of 
this criminality most severely will get it. We can only make a 
success of this fight by co-operation between all the depart¬ 
ments. Our office is at the disposal of the customs or the Dry 
squad any time. I wish you would come with me, Montague. 
We’ve another little matter to attend to.” 

He drove rapidly home. A detective was on guard at the 
crossing near his house as usual. Jim pulled up before him 
in the clearest light so the man would have no difficulty in 
telling who it was. “You’re under arrest. Your actions 
hanging around here create the suspicion that you’re a hold¬ 
up. Get in the rear seat.” The man hesitated. “Get in 
the rear seat. You’re going to jail to-night along with Delker. 
We’re going to find out why you’re here.” The man climbed 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 4 u 

in. Jim's tone didn’t leave any doubt as to what he meant 
and the detective was too shrewd to try to boss the sheriff 
when he knew the sheriff had the law on his side. Jim stop¬ 
ped a moment at the house and hastily told Mary the situa¬ 
tion. “I’ll be home sometime. I don’t know when,” he 
said at parting. 

They drove to the jail and left the prisoner and Jim got a 
blank search warrant and filled it out giving authority to 
search Delker’s office for contraband liquor. He drove to 
the Judge’s house and awakened him and got him to sign it 
and explained the situation to him. “I wish you’d be at the 
court house at eight-thirty. We’ve got something very im¬ 
portant at that hour which I’ll explain there.” 

“I’ll be there,” said the Judge. 

Jim then drove around and wakened the two county com¬ 
missioners, Madison and Malarty, and said the same thing to 
them after explaining the night’s work. He and Montague 
then drove out and met the caravan just coming into the 
City. 

“Let Delker come with me,” said Jim. Delker was half 
thrown in Jim’s car by the guards and they drove to his office. 
“I’ll take these cuffs off. We want you to help burglarize 
your own office. Unlock the door.” 

“By what authority?” asked Delker defiantly. 

“This!” 

Delker quickly read the search warrant and unlocked the 
door. Jim took a hasty look around. “I think there’s 
whiskey concealed in this desk, open it,” said Jim, pointing 
to Delker’s private desk, a splendid sample of the best roll- 
topped desk type. Delker smiled indulgently and opened 
the desk. At one side of it lay a roll of typewritten reports. 
Jim read the heading of the top one: “Report of Sadie Carney 
from nine to twelve, office closed half hour, from twelve- 
thirty to three-thirty.” The next one was headed: “ Report 
of Ella Jansen from three-thirty to eleven-thirty, office closed 
for night.” The pile of reports were dated the past four days 
and were a complete record of everything said in the sherifPs 


412 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

private office. No names were mentioned, just the words 
uttered were noted. 

“Mr. Delker,” said Jim politely, “you’ll allow me to take 
these with me to compare with my own reports of what was 
said in my private office lately. I want your reports to be 
exactly so, so; verbatim et literatim, as we used to say in our 
embryo Latin classes. It might lead to serious difficulties 
in yout bootlegging operations if these reports of these young 
lady stenographers that worked for most of the week in the 
cubby hole of the county prosecutor’s office were not correct 
even to the minute when my office closed. I can have them 
temporarily, can’t I, please?” While he was talking Jim was 
rolling up the reports. Delker was so amazed at Jim’s rev¬ 
elation regarding where the notes were taken that he began 
to stammer an answer but got all mixed up. “Oh, never 
mind explaining,” said Jim. “You haven’t refused me per¬ 
mission to take them which gives me tacit permission to take 
them. I don’t exactly know what tacit permission means but 
I know it’s a good kind of permission because I heard the 
court use the expression one day. I’ll take these because 
you’ve given me tacit permission,” and he put them carefully 
in his inside pocket. “Now we’ll go to the court house.” 
Delker was put in a cell by himself and Jim and Montague 
went to the office which was crowded inside and out with the 
deputies, all jubilant and excited. 

The gray dawn was just breaking, one of those warm, de¬ 
lightful dawns of a Puget Sound perfect day. Jim and 
Montague stood in the doorway, and looked out on the clutter 
of autos with the guards patrolling in front of them; and in on 
the tiers of cells with prisoners’ faces looking out; and at the 
throng of deputies talking and laughing. “It’s the begin¬ 
ning of the end,” said Montague. 

“It is the end,” said Jim. 

“ Boys, you’ll be wanted here at nine. Better go and get a 
few winks of sleep,” said Jim. 

“Have you any old newspapers here?” asked one of the 
young men. “We’ll not have much time to go to the hotel. 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 413 

I’m going to stretch out right here in the corridor. It’s warm 
enough here to sleep.” In ten minutes all the younger dep¬ 
uties had stretched clean newspapers along the corridors 
and with coats for pillows lay down for a short sleep. 

Half-a-dozen newspaper men rushed in and surrounded 
Jim in his private office, clamoring for news. “Not a word 
from me, boys,” said Jim. “ I don’t have it in for you fellows. 
You’re only reporters, but up to the present time I’ve got the 
worst of it from the newspapers. I’m going to break up the 
whiskey traffic through this northwest and I’m going to break 
up the whiskey gang or gangs in the northwest. The semi¬ 
criminal clubs of this city and the so-called liberal business 
men are going to get it in the neck good and hard along with 
the real criminals. There’ll be no more sneering smiles and 
snickering by the high-class liberal elements. They’ll walk 
the chalk line from this morning at nine o’clock. As for 
most of the newspapers they can hunt the news elsewhere. 
I’m not going to kiss the hand that smites me. Now, there’s 
the door and it opens outward.” The reporters protested 
but Jim was firm. “I don’t blame you fellows or the ma¬ 
jority of the newspaper men, but a very few proprietors of 
newspapers have swung the press against me. I didn’t kow¬ 
tow to them when I was supposedly down and out and I won’t 
now.” 

“I’ll report exactly what he said to the chief,” said one 
reporter. It was a unanimous decision. Telephone bells 
were soon ringing for editors and proprietors. Jim’s talk 
had gone straight home. 

“This is Bush of the Clarion ,” announced a voice over the 
’phone to Jim. “Our city editor has just told me what you 
said. We’ve two sides to our newspaper: the news and the 
opinion. We want to spread this spectacular affair of yours 
all over our news pages. What our opinion column says is 
our affair. As a matter of fact, it doesn’t make much differ¬ 
ence what it does say. It’s the news that counts. Give our 
man everything you can. It will go, and go big to-day.” 
Practically the same thing came from the other papers. The 


4M 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

reporters thronged back. Jim turned over half his private 
office to them and asked Montague to answer all questions. 

At eight-thirty they were hammering away, turning his 
office into a newspaper room. “Come with me, boys,” 
said Jim. “ I’ve got something that means a good deal to you 
and to me and to other individuals and the public. Come on, 
Montague.” Jim led the way to the county commissioners’ 
where the commissioners joined him and then to the Judge’s 
chambers where the Judge was already seated. 

“I want you to come with us, Judge, for a few minutes. 
I’ve something important to announce and can do it better 
in the prosecutor’s office.” The Judge and Jim led the big 
procession and they entered the prosecutor’s office just as 
that official got there. Jim led the way through to the inner 
right-hand office and motioned to the Judge to come and 
look. He threw open the door of the clothes closet and there 
at the small table, lighted by an incandescent bulb, sat a 
stenographer with a telephone device clamped on her head, 
which was attached to a wire running to the wall and down 
through the floor. The transom of the closet was open for 
ventilation. A pile of notes lay before her and her pencil 
was poised in her hand. Her face flushed, and a frightened 
look came into her eyes as the big crowd surged around and 
she saw the man whose words she had been copying at their 
head with the Judge. 

“You can suspend your work for a few minutes and come 
out. We want to talk with you,” said Jim. She took off 
the headpiece and came out. The prosecutor had entered 
his crowded office and stood in the middle of the room showing 
confusion, amazement, and doubt in his face. He knew the 
extraordinary scene meant something to him, but what? He 
was not long in doubt. Jim pulled the roll of notes from 
Delker’s office from his inside pocket, opened them, and held 
them open in his hand. 

He placed the young lady directly opposite the prosecutor. 
“Would you please tell us your name?” he asked the girl 
kindly. 


4i5 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

“Sadie Carney,” said the girl. 

“Til now explain the whole situation,” said Jim to the 
Judge and commissioners. “I was elected primarily to fight 
the bootlegger, the moonshiner, the wholesale whiskey seller, 
the bottle peddler, the seller by the glass, the dope peddler, and 
every criminal and criminal firm dealing in contraband liquor 
and drugs. Criminal gangs, with Lew Delker as the master 
mind in the local fields and bigger criminals in the distant 
supply points, controlled this district and trampled on the 
laws of the land and the regulations of decent society. They 
had the support of the clubs and the liberal citizens among the 
business population and the support of every form of vice 
and criminality. Among the active supporters of Lew Del¬ 
ker’s infamous banditti was the county prosecutor of this dis¬ 
trict; an official sworn to uphold the laws and the guardian 
of the state’s interests. 

“Lew Delker’s influence elected him. It was necessary 
that Lew Delker, the chief criminal of this district, the one 
big boss of criminality and vice, should know what my office 
was doing. He detailed detectives to watch me night and day. 
Here’s the man who was on duty last night to shadow me,” 
and Jim indicated the detective whom a deputy had brought 
in, “and Delker and the county prosecutor entered into a 
conspiracy to learn every word spoken in my private office so 
that they might offset and nullify everything we did. 

“They put a dictograph in my office five days ago and ran 
a wire from it to this clothes closet up here in the prosecutor’s 
office. They hired stenographers to be on duty every hour 
my office was open and take down every word spoken there. 
These reports went from the prosecutor’s office to Lew 
Delker’s. I took these reports I have here in my hand from 
Delker’s desk this morning at daylight. They contain every 
word spoken in my office for days. I ask the deputy here to 
bring the reports now lying on this young lady’s table. Just 
as I thought. They are verbatim reports of what was said 
this morning in my office ?” 

“Miss Carney, who hired you?” 


4 i6 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

"Lew Delker.” 

"And who furnished you that clothes closet for a work 
room ?” 

"The prosecutor.” 

"To whom do you give these reports?” 

"To the prosecutor.” 

"There you have it all. Lew Delker pays the stenographer. 
The prosecutor provides his office for them to work in. 
The reports go through the prosecutor’s hands to Delker. 
Now, Mr. Detective, who hires you to shadow me?” 

"Lew Delker.” 

"How many detectives are on duty each twenty-four 
hours doing that?” 

V "Four.” 

"There you have that part of it.” 

"Now, Mr. Prosecutor,” he continued, as he rose above 
the attorney and talked directly to him, "I’ll give you the 
privilege of resigning at once. You’re caught. Will you get 
out quietly or will you fight?” The attorney was white and 
trembling. He stood irresolute. "Mr. Prosecutor, let me 
explain,” said Jim, in the same stern tone. "You’re not a 
bad man. You’re only weak. You were the tool of the 
whiskey gang. For paltry gold or something you thought 
equal to gold you betrayed your state. When you joined 
Delker to beat the official life out of me, to knock my official 
brains out, you were not fighting me. You were actively 
fighting the United States and the State of Washington. 
I was only a minor figure. You were one of a band of crim¬ 
inals who are organized to break all our country’s laws and 
who are breaking them every day and every night. You were 
using every means at your command, and they were many 
and very powerful, to turn the United States over to crim¬ 
inals. Still you are not a bad man at heart. The weak man 
or the ignorant man or the theory man in responsible office 
may be more dangerous than a real criminally inclined 
official. Now go into your private office and consider this 
matter alone. I’ll give you five minutes to resign. If you 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 417 

don’t resign in that time I’ll take steps to force you out. I 
ask the officials here to remain for five minutes.” 

The attorney without a word walked dazedly into his pri¬ 
vate office, white faced and shaky, like a man with the palsy. 
The extraordinary scene, with Big Jim looming up above his 
fellows, controlling seemingly the very thoughts of the 
leading participants, forcing convicting answers from wit¬ 
nesses by the very strength of his logical arraignment, 
fairly took the breath away from the spectators. In one 
minute the prosecutor appeared and with trembling hand 
passed over to Jim two lines scrawled unevenly across a sheet 
of paper. It was his resignation. Jim handed it to County 
Commissioner Malarty and asked him to read it. Malarty 
did so. “If you’ll be in your office in fifteen minutes I’ll 
drop in and see you,” said Jim to the attorney. Then he 
turned to Delker who had been brought in by a deputy and 
had been standing unnoticed in the rear of the crowd and 
said: “You see your handiwork Mr. Delker. Have you any¬ 
thing to say?” Delker seemingly tried to answer but words 
failed him. He shook his head slowly. Jim and the Judge 
led the procession out. The attorney half staggered [back 
into his office and collapsed in a chair at the desk. He 
dropped his head on his arms and cried like a child. 

The Judge went back to his office without a word. No one 
spoke in the procession till they reached the commissioners’ 
office. “We have a tremendous amount of work to do this 
morning,” said Jim. “Can we have Victor Delmont ap¬ 
pointed temporarily to take charge of it as there’s no head now 
to the prosecutor’s office. He’ll need the help of several 
other lawyers taking statements to-day.” 

“I move that Victor Delmont be appointed to take charge 
of the prosecuting attorney’s office temporarily,” said Madi¬ 
son. 

“Second the motion,” said Malarty. 

“Make it unanimous,” said Dunmore. 

“There’s one request I want to make,” said Jim. “The 
prosecutor, who has just resigned, has full knowledge of the 


4 i8 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

business of the office. I request that he be retained to act 
under Delmont. There’s a large amount of office business to 
be closed up and he can do it better than anyone else pro¬ 
vided he is made a deputy. He is a lawyer of ability, hasn’t 
any very great amount of wealth, has a family to support, 
and we shouldn’t throw him out barehanded. Judgment 
in his case will be in the hands of the court or the bar associa¬ 
tion. Let them act judicially. It will be better than for us 
to do so now.” 

“I’ve no objections,” said Malarty, “provided he doesn’t 
have anything to do with the liquor cases.” 

“That’s understood,” said Jim. The motion to appoint 
him temporarily was carried. 

Jim went back to the prosecutor’s office. He found the 
occupant still sitting there in front of the desk with his head 
down on his arms. “You’re appointed deputy under Del¬ 
mont to handle the office business outside of the whiskey 
cases,” said Jim as he leaned against the door. The attorney 
slowly raised his head. It seemed to Jim as if he had aged 
ten years in thirty minutes. 

“Outside the whiskey cases,” he repeated. Then he 
clenched his hands tightly and the lines deepened on his 
drawn face. “The whiskey cases have ruined me. I was a 
pawn. They played me. I never meant to do a criminal act. 
The whiskey developed one step at a time and I went with it 
one step after another. If it had sprung up all at once I 
would have fought them. When I took the first step I felt 
bound to take the next one and then the next till I’ve reached 
the legal, social, political, religious gallows. I’m at the foot 
of it now. I could stand the punishment for my own fool 
folly but my family, God help them, they’re to be dragged 
down, too.” He leaned his head on his hands and again the 
deep emotions of the hour mastered him. 

“Let me tell you something,” said Jim kindly. The world 
is never as black as it can be imagined. You were wrong. 
You were with the other crowd, the wrong crowd. We had 
to get you out of here or lose our fight. At least it might 


419 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

have been very difficult to get results. The popular judg¬ 
ment is that you’re not a criminal at heart; that you went 
with that crowd step by step, as you say. Now brace up. 
Go at this county work manfully and clear it up. Work for 
the interests of the boss, the people of the district, instead of 
for the boss you were working for, bootleg whiskey. Tell 
your wife everything, just as it is, and if you ever prayed to 
God in your life, pray now.” 

As Jim talked the drawn expression of the lawyer’s face 
changed to more natural lines. The hopeless, hunted look 
went out of his eyes. “I’ll do everything you say, Mr. Al¬ 
bright; everything you say. I see my way clear. I’ll make 
good yet and I’ll do it by going to the foot of God’s throne 
and pleading for forgiveness and help. Do you know,” he 
continued, as the last vestige of the look of previous despair 
left his face, “that the words we learn about our mother’s 
knee are the words that go farthest and stay longest with us 
and that’s what she taught us boys. I’m going to brace up 
and make good.” 

“I’ll see you later; there’s a lot to do; see Delmont at once 
and get to work and clear this jumble up for the court and the 
commissioners,” said Jim as he turned and walked rapidly 
away. 

The lawyer watched him down the corridor. “And that’s 
the man I went into a damnable conspiracy to ruin; and he 
knew it and knows it now; and at this crisis he’s gone to the 
commissioners and got me this appointment that saves my 
very life and the life of my family and comes to me and lifts 
me back to earth from hades. Big Jim, you’re a Christian. 
I’m going to try to be one.” He rose up determinedly. “I’m 
going right over and tell Minnie and the kids and we’ll all 
pray together.” 

“How’s the hospital cases?” asked Jim as he reached his 
office. 

“One very seriously injured; one injured; two not much 
hurt.” 

“Will they all live?” 


420 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

“The doctors say they will.” 

“That’s a very great satisfaction. We came out of that 
muss very lucky.” 

“I should say we did, considering the amount of captured 
army supplies,” said the deputy, pointing to a big box filled 
with rifles, revolvers, and ammunition. 

Delmont, the new prosecutor, pressed two other lawyers into 
service to help to take statements from the drivers and others 
who might make witnesses. The court house hummed like a 
beehive. A lawyer applied for Delker’s release. “Not till 
we get straightened out and see where we stand,” said Del¬ 
mont. “But we’ll put up bail; any amount you ask.” 

“We’ll not release the big criminal of this gang till we know 
the whys and wherefores of all this criminality of which he 
has been the leader.” 

“Well, I’ll apply to the court.” 

“All right, we’ll fight you.” The lawyer knew well enough 
that he couldn’t gain anything by going to the court and he 
didn’t do so. He waited and so did Delker in his cell. 

Jim sent for his breakfast and dinner and worked all daylong. 
In the late evening Delmont called him upstairs. “I’ve 
looked over these cases and the evidence you have piled up. 
To-morrow we’ll arraign Delker. We’ll ask for one-hundred- 
thousand dollar bonds in the cases against him we have al¬ 
ready examined. His two launches and eleven high-priced 
autos will be confiscated later and liquor that would retail 
for a fabulous sum. We’ll close up as nuisances, under the 
abatement law, six of Delker’s main joints that he’s just 
bought and three clubs. We’ll seize and confiscate all the 
furniture and close the buildings for one year. Is that pro¬ 
gram enough for you to-morrow or do you want some more to 
handle?” 

“And what of Delker?” 

“Delker will be tried and go to the penitentiary where he 
belongs. Keep enough deputies to handle everything ex¬ 
peditiously to-morrow. Most of those drivers are just hired 
men but they’re in this conspiracy and I’m going to try to 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 421 

hold all of them for Delker’s trial by getting them a jail 
sentence and more. They’ve all confessed and will plead 
guilty. Delker will probably fight. He has money and his 
nerve isn’t all gone yet although it will be before he gets 
through with this. My predecessor came to me voluntarily 
and told me a straight story of his dealings with Delker. 
He’s doing good work on the state business and will go on the 
stand if necessary in the Delker case. We’ve got them on 
the run and we’ll keep after them hot foot.” 

The boy came in with the Evening Clarion. Jim opened it. 
The front page was completely filled with Jim’s exploit, not 
another word on any other subject on that page. The sec¬ 
ond page was half filled. Other papers came in. They were 
about in the same condition. The newsboys on the streets 
were yelling their heads off. The change in the newspapers 
showed that the fight was over and a new regime in power. 

The next morning Jim and his force wereon hand early. The 
lawyers and stenographers had worked through the night. 
The informations were ready. The Judge ascended the bench 
at nine o’clock. The whiskey gang were already there in 
charge of the sheriff’s force. Delker was the only one who 
had a lawyer. He had offered to furnish the others legal 
counsel but they had confessed and refused the offer. They 
had not been allowed to talk with each other but each one 
had divined that the others had told all so each confessed 
everything and their stories all agreed. One after another 
were arraigned and when asked by the Judge whether they 
were guilty or not guilty each said: “Guilty.” 

“I’ll reserve sentence till to-morrow at ten o’clock in your 
case,” the Judge stated to each one. Delker came last. 
“Not guilty,” he said defiantly in answer to the Judge’s ques¬ 
tion. 

“We ask that a reasonable amount of bail be fixed by the 
court,” said his lawyer. The Judge looked at the prosecutor. 

“We ask that the bail in this defendant’s case be fixed at 
not less than one hundred thousand dollars. The circum¬ 
stances demand that sufficient bail be furnished. The retail 


422 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

price of the liquor that we charge him with transporting in 
this one case would approximate one hundred and fifty thou¬ 
sand dollars. He is the head of a great liquor combine in this 
district to whom a small amount of money is no object. 
There are other criminal jurisdictions waiting to arraign him. 
I ask the representative of the Federal law to state what their 
intentions are.” 

A strange attorney stood up. “I represent the Federal dis¬ 
trict attorney here. I have looked over the evidence. We 
wish to file criminal charges of a serious nature against this 
defendant when this court’s jurisdiction ceases.” 

“And I represent the United States Immigration Bureau,” 
said another stranger, rising to his feet as the Federal attorney 
sat down. “We wish to file criminal charges of a very serious 
nature against this defendant when other jurisdictions re¬ 
lease him. I have been investigating for weeks and find 
evidence of the most substantial nature; the confessions of 
over two hundred aliens that this defendant was the main 
conspirator in a conspiracy to bring men into the United 
States illegally. These men confessed that they were rushed 
across the border from Canada on unfrequented roads at 
night and colonized at camps for the purpose of voting 
against prohibition at the late election. Many of them voted 
illegally through this conspiracy, according to the evidence 
which I am ready to turn over to the district prosecutor, as 
that particular charge of illegal voting is under his jurisdic¬ 
tion. All of these men were brought across from a foreign 
country in defiance of two United States immigration laws: 
one forbidding the bringing in of aliens at any other point 
than those places legally designated and the other forbidding 
laborers under contract to work in the United States to be 
brought in from a foreign country. Both infringements 
carry heavy penalties. I apologize to the court and the 
attorneys for springing this information at this late hour but 
the fact is I just got to the city with all my evidence in shape 
ten minutes ago.” 

This unexpected revelation of other charges gave a dramatic 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 423 

turn to a dramatic scene. It was piling criminal charge on 
criminal charge. ‘‘Til fix the amount of the bail at ten 
o’clock to-morrow,” said the Judge after a moment’s thought. 
“In the meantime, the prosecutor can look into this new 
evidence and act on it as he sees fit. These other cases in 
abatement may be now presented.” The prosecutor then 
proceeded to read affidavit after affidavit, some twenty-five 
of them, setting forth in effect that six buildings, naming and 
describing them, belonging to Lew Delker, and three club 
houses, belonging to different owners, these club houses being 
leased to other parties, were public nuisances owing to their 
being notorious liquor resorts and in which liquor was stored 
and retailed. The detailed facts in each case were given. 
At the end was a request that the nuisance be abated, the 
furniture confiscated and sold, and the buildings closed one 
year as provided by the state law. 

“I will sign these citations for the owners to appear to¬ 
morrow at ten o’clock and show cause why this should not be 
done,” said the Judge. Court was then adjourned. The 
prisoners were marched back to jail where Delker and his 
attorney had a long talk. 

“I wish you would give me as complete a history as you can 
of each of these auto driver defendants after an unbiased 
investigation,” said the Judge to the prosecutor as he left 
the bench. The day and night were filled with excitement 
and work around the court house. The newspapers had 
voracious appetites for news. Brigades of reporters were on 
hand at all times. Jim had graduated from a county and 
district to a state fame and news regarding his doings was 
printed in interstate papers and across the Canadian border. 

The next morning at ten the suppressed excitement was in¬ 
tense. The court house was the center of the city and coun¬ 
try for the time being. At court opening Delker was the 
central figure. The newspapers had outlined that if found 
guilty in the various jurisdictions the cumulative sentences 
might be for a long time. They might take up his natural 
life. He looked haggard and worn as he entered the court 


424 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

room with his lawyer. He had not slept; the buoyancy had 
evaporated. He wanted a drink of his own whiskey to tone 
him up and he couldn’t get it. As he walked through the 
corridor on his way to the court room a messenger boy handed 
him a telegram. He read it and showed it to his attorney. 
It said: “Market panicky stop we advise you remargin.” 
The message was signed by a widely known broker firm of 
Chicago. As he sat down in the court room another yellow 
message was handed to him. It read: “Market slumping 
badly stop remargin at once.” His face turned paler, the 
color of ashes, and he crumpled the messages in his hand. 

The Judge took his seat. “I address the prisoners who 
drove the autos in the criminal expedition of two nights ago,” 
he said as he looked down on them. “ I have given your cases 
much serious consideration. Yours is not the ordinary case. 
Individually you were breaking the laws of the state and 
nation and collectively you were each involved in a great 
conspiracy to nullify those laws by common agreement; 
to disregard them because of the strength of the numbers in 
your organization. Your criminality is worse than that of 
the individual criminal. You struck at both law and society. 
I’m going to mete out exemplary punishment because of this 
dangerous quality of the crime you have pleaded guilty to 
and I’ve segregated your punishments according to the degree 
of responsibility I thought each bore in this criminal expedi¬ 
tion.” He called on the youngest driver to stand up. “I 
sentence you to one year in the county jail.” He then 
called up one after another and sentenced them from one year 
in the county jail to two years in the penitentiary at hard 
labor. 

“I’ve considered the amount of your bail bond, Delker,” 
he said. “It is fixed at one hundred thousand dollars.” At 
that moment a messenger boy thrust another message into 
Delker’s hand. His attorney read it over his shoulder. It 
said: “Your margin wiped out.” Delker gazed stupidly 
at the message. Then he drew his hand across his brow as 
if to gather his thoughts together coherently. The sweat 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 425 

started on his face. He stared straight ahead as if not 
hearing his attorney who was whispering to him. The court 
had already called the next case and was proceeding with 
it, thinking the Delker matter ended for the present, when 
Delker staggered to his feet. He half lunged forward to the 
dais in front of the Judge, his face ashy in color and his lip 
quivering. He essayed to speak but seemed unable. The 
Judge stopped and looked at him. His attorney came slowly 
to his side, undecided what to do. For a half minute Delker 
tried to talk but only mumbled. Then he found his voice; 
a strained, unnatural tone as if his vocal chords were affected. 

“Your Honor,” he said, “I plead guilty. I’m a broke 
man and I can’t fight. Two months ago I had a fortune in 
actual money in the banks. I bought much property in the 
city, too much, for I gave mortgages for part of the pay¬ 
ments. Most of that property has been made worthless 
by the abatement action begun which will no doubt end in a 
judgment of this court closing those business houses. I had 
the income of a prince from that property last week. To¬ 
morrow it will be a liability instead of an asset. It is all in the 
lower part of town and the mortgages will take it when the 
law gets through with it. It will not pay the interest on the 
borrowed money without considering the principal, if my 
line of business is closed up in those places. At the time I 
plunged in real estate I also plunged in the stock market one 
hundred thousand dollars in speculations. It looked good. 
At one time I had a quarter of a million out of my hundred 
thousand. Just now I got these messages from my brokers 
stating that the market went to pieces and my total invest¬ 
ment is wiped out. I haven’t a cent to my name as I stand 
here. I’m broke, and I’m guilty. Sentence me quick and 
have it over with.” He leaned heavily on the desk in front 
of him and stared fixedly at the Judge with a glassy stare. 

“Do you wish to change your plea to guilty without con¬ 
sulting your attorney?” asked the Judge. Delker nodded 
his head half-a-dozen times. The Judge looked inquiringly 
at the attorney. 


426 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

The latter shook his head. “ I’ve nothing to suggest. My 
client has taken his case in his own hands and seemingly is 
determined/’ he said. 

“I sentence you to five years in the state penitentiary at 
hard labor and a fine of five thousand dollars/’ said the Judge. 

Delker nodded again several times as if acquiescing in the 
sentence and made an effort to turn around. He would have 
fallen but his lawyer caught him and he and a deputy led the 
deposed king, now a staggering wreck, from the room, as the 
great audience looked in absolute, tense, wondering silence 
at the tragic passing of Delker, the whiskey monarch, to the 
felon’s cell. There was some pity in that perfectly silent 
gaze of that great throng, some amazement, but the unan¬ 
nounced verdict that showed in the eyes of the mass of the 
spectators was: “It is the triumph of the law over the crim¬ 
inal. He ran his course and has reached its end. The story 
of the criminal in all ages has been retold in the career of this 
broken derelict whom the law of the land is lashing with a 
whip of scorpions.” 

Word passed swiftly out through the city and country 
and consternation reigned among the lawbreakers. The 
sentence of Delker and his drivers showed what they might 
expect when they came before the Judge. The proprietors of 
the club houses and other places that the abatement pro¬ 
ceedings were directed against knew already their fate. Their 
places would be closed for a full year and a heavy penalty 
would be exacted besides. The whole climax was a death 
blow to respectable defiance of the law. It set thousands to 
wondering if they might not be next in line to be haled before 
the court, and all over the city during the afternoon, evening, 
and night there was a hasty packing of trunks and valises 
and every avenue out of the city and country around was 
choked with emigrants; respectable citizens who had been 
laughing at the law; employees of the drink joints, high and 
low; bottle peddlers; bootleggers; chauffeurs, who knew too 
much; criminals of all kinds who fraternized with and thrived 
on the profits from whiskey devotees; dope peddlers and dope 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 427 

fiends; men and women of the underworld; a hegira of un¬ 
desirables. The city lost one tenth of its population in 
twenty-four hours. A drink of whiskey couldn’t be bought 
or begged. “Big Jim Albright organized a rebellion and 
accomplished a revolution,” was a flash head all across the 
front page of the Evening Clarion that night. 


CHAPTER XXIV 


R ED BARTH came into Jim’s office the next morning 
with a jailer who left him there and returned to his 
- duties. “Hello, Red,” said Jim. “How are you? 
You’re somewhat pale but you don’t look so tousled and 
blear-eyed as you did. How do you feel?” 

“Feel fine but a little weak. I wanted to tell you. The 
Judge says I can go out on Monday and I’m afraid. They’ll 
be waiting for me and I’m afraid it’s the old life for me. I’ve 
put in an awful time in jail, locked up without morphine. 
I guess I was clear crazy for a long time. I’ve been coming 
to, getting back to my natural self, but I don’t believe I could 
stand them off yet. I mean my friends the dope fiends. 
They’re waiting for me, I know. It’s an obsession with a 
dope fiend to persuade someone else to become a fiend. 
They’re crazy on that subject and they know me and know 
that I’ve broke off and every one of them will be hammering 
at my door to get in to give me drugs. Can’t I stay in jail 
another month or two till I get more strength and will power? 
I’m on the right road now and if I only had more time I might 
make it. I’ll work for the jailer and earn my keep.” 

“Sure you can,” said Jim, as he noted the querulous ear¬ 
nestness. “Sure you can. You don’t have to go back to the 
old life. You can stay here three months more if you wish. 
I’ll get you work. Have you any relatives out West?” 

“No one in the West. All my relations are in the East. 
Red Barth is not my name. My real family name is known and 
respected among the old, exclusive, pioneer names of one of 
the largest Eastern cities. I was born there, graduated from 
a large Eastern university, was admitted to the bar, had the 
brightest of futures. I took sick, inflammatory rheumatism 

428 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 429 

or something akin to it, a very painful disease of the joints. 
I got using morphine to kill the pain; copied the doctor’s 
methods. It worked fine, too fine. I woke up one day a 
morphine fiend. My mother and sister were all that was left 
of our family. I kept it from them for a time but the mor¬ 
phine user can’t keep his habit a secret for any length of time. 

“My relatives found it out. I tried to break the habit 
and they tried to help me. It was no use; at least no per¬ 
manent use. I backslid several times. I held my position 
at the bar and in society fairly well. Then the law firm I was 
with let me out; gently but firmly informed me they knew 
and that it was no longer possible for me to continue with 
them. I began to slide down. My sister married into a 
high-class family and deserted me; disowned me. I should 
no longer disgrace our family name and her connections. 

“My mother stayed with me. I suppose it is the old, old 
story: ‘A father may turn his back upon his child; brothers 
and sisters may become inveterate enemies; husbands may 
desert their wives and wives their husbands, but a mother’s 
love endures through all. In good and evil report, in the 
face of a world’s condemnation, a mother still loves on and 
still hopes that her boy will turn from his evil ways and re¬ 
pent.’ My mother was my one friend and guide and coun¬ 
sellor and only hope. Then she died and I died with her. 
I was dopey when she passed away in her infinite sorrow; and 
dopey at the funeral. I didn’t realize my loss. Then the 
next day I recovered my senses and realized. I was weak 
in body and mind. I went out to her grave and lay there 
on the cold ground and cried for a day and a night till the 
police dragged me away and locked me up to do me a kind¬ 
ness. It was the sorrowful, the tragic finale of my home life 
that had been heaven and ended in hell. 

“I drifted West. I was beating my way on a freight train 
in Ohio and told a fellow hobo that my name was Barth. He 
supplied the word 'Red’ and I’ve been Red Barth, the dope 
fiend, ever since.” 

“Well,” said Jim slowly, “you’ll quit being Red Barth, the 


430 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

dope fiend, and get back to your own family name. You’ll 
come with me to church to-morrow. I’ll give you an order 
for a complete new suit of clothes, even to a necktie. You’ll 
go down with the jailer and get them and you’ll come with 
me to-morrow to our home and go to church out in the coun¬ 
try. You can live here and work your way so that you’ll be 
independent.” 

“I haven’t been to church in ten years,” said Red ruefully. 

“Well, you’re going to-morrow. I’ll call for you at nine 
o’clock. Give this note to the jailer and he’ll take you down¬ 
town in the auto to fit you up with some new togs.” 

The next morning when Jim and Mary drove round to the 
jail Red stepped out; but it wasn’t Red Barth, the dope 
fiend, any more. He looked and acted like a young banker or 
merchant or professional man of some importance. They 
went out to Sunday-school and Red took a visitor’s seat 
while Jim and Mary went ahead with their usual duties. 
Then after church services and a sermon by Reverend Story 
they all went to dinner at Judge Albright’s. Red showed 
through all the day the training of the environment of his 
youth; it came to him naturally when he got back to the kind 
of people to whose plane of living he by heritage belonged. 
He was at home among refined conditions. 

They drove back to town and Jim and Red went over to 
the office. 

“I’ve got back to my own style and manner of life,” said 
Red. “To-day brings up all the memories of home and home 
life.” 

“You’re depending altogether too much on yourself in this 
dope fight,” said Jim. “God alone can provide weapons and 
armor and strength of soul to fight morphine successfully.” 

“But I’m not a Christian; I’m not a church member; I’m 
outside Christianity completely; how can God help me?” 

“You can’t become either a Christian or a church member 
without trying. You must put your mind and body in the 
right attitude for becoming Christian; get into the domain 
and atmosphere of unworth and contrition and appeal and 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 431 

then pray for help and keep on praying. The earnest seeker 
is never turned away and God can give you the strength 
you need. No other power can. You can’t create will 
power yourself.” 

“ I’ll get down on my knees to-night and ask God to help 
me,” said Red, earnestly. 

“Do it,” said Jim. “It’s where hope lies. You must be 
in earnest; you must have faith and faith will come; you must 
pray and keep on praying. We will be with you; all your 
friends will be with you but God alone is the power to depend 
on. Pray earnestly; have earnest faith; trust God; He will 
answer you by giving strength and will and determined front 
when the friendly dope companion of your other days comes 
with his temptation.” Jim walked away and left Red with a 
new thought; a new hope; a new vision of a new life. 

God would save him if he would earnestly ask in earnest 
faith and trust. He would do it. He walked to his cell 
and there alone knelt down and prayed; something he hadn’t 
done since he was a child at his mother’s knee. “I feel 
stronger now,” he said as he arose. He went to his old 
weather-beaten valise and brought out from the very bottom 
a worn and stained covered leather-bound Bible. He sat 
down on the edge of his cot and opened it and tears came into 
his eyes. There in the old-style penmanship of the girl’s 
academy of sixty years ago, the penmanship that is as dis¬ 
tinctive of that era as the dresses that were then worn, were 
the words: “From Mother to Ernest.” He was still reading 
when the jailer called him to their family table for supper. 

Another two months flew by. Jim and Mary were busy all 
day long. Whiskey had been banished; gambling dens 
cleaned out; the city was sober and the country roads were 
safe any hour of the day or night. The doors and windows 
of a dozen business rooms were locked and fastened up for 
one year by the stern command of the law under the abate¬ 
ment act; a silent but loud-speaking warning to the public. 
They were ever present before the vision of the liberal citizen 


432 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

and the former sneerer at the anti-whiskey law and he 
profited by the warning. His clubs and his lawbreaking 
liberalism were things of the past. The sneer and the smile 
of derision had gone for good. 

One day there met a self-called convention in the city. It 
was a number of leading political spirits from all parts of the 
state who met informally to talk over political matters in 
general as they affected their party and especially the gover¬ 
norship and other state officers in the election that was now 
not far away. They were seated comfortably in an upstairs 
parlor in one of the hotels talking amicably and frankly. 

“Big Jim Albright is the best advertised man in the state,” 
said one. “He is the most eligible candidate for governor 
on our ticket from a public point of view.” 

“What kind of a man is he in private life; over-religious and 
over-zealous, isn’t he?” said another. 

“He’s a thorough Christian,” said Caledon, “but he doesn’t 
preach it; he lives his religion day by day. He breaks his 
criminal opponents to a pulp and then patches them up and 
converts them into his warmest friends.” 

“He believes that: ‘To err is human; to forgive divine’,” 
said Reyland. “Forgiveness is a special prerogative of his 
kind of religion; make men, not break men, is his motto in 
actual practice.” 

“That sounds good,” said one of the strangers. “How is he 
in public life outside of his liquor campaign?” 

“He always looks to the exact point where he wants to go 
and keeps his eye on that point and takes the shortest cut. 
His lines of action are as straight as a carpenter’s straight¬ 
edge and he leads the way himself. He doesn’t tell the other 
fellow to go ahead. He’s the leader. Where Big Jim Albright 
is there’s the head of the table.” 

“That’s the kind of man we want for our candidate for 
governor right now,” said another. “Let’s decide on him 
and all support him and notify him of that fact to-day and 
ask him to run.” There was unanimous approval and they 
drove over to Jim’s. He was in the office. After preliminary 


433 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

introductions one of the strangers said: “Mr. Albright, we are 
informal representatives of our party from all over the state; 
holding a self-elected and entirely informal convention here 
just to talk things over and agree as gentlemen of the same 
opinions politically to an unwritten agreement on certain 
party fundamentals of action. We have unanimously de¬ 
cided on you as the most eligible candidate for governor this 
fall on our ticket. We pledge our individual support and are 
satisfied the party will be with us. Will you accept ?” 

“No,” said Jim. “I can’t afford to run for governor of 
the state. I’ve had some experience in practical campaigning 
for a local office under this primary nomination system. I’m 
a poor man, and no poor man can afford to make a primary 
election campaign for a state office at a cost of five thousand 
to ten thousand dollars at least and then turn round and make 
the election campaign in the next two months at a similar 
cost. Don’t count on me. If I got a nomination in a con¬ 
vention, as state candidates should; and had a party platform 
and policy to run on, as that convention would promulgate; 
and had the party organization to make my campaign for me, 
as state candidates should have, I would accept.” 

“But we’ll pledge ourselves to form clubs all over the state, 
just as your friends did in your county campaign, and we 
pledge you our word as men, that these clubs will carry you 
through both campaigns. All we ask from you is to make 
one tour of the state in your auto and call at each county seat 
and large town and get acquainted with most of the leading 
fellows at each place.” 

“In that case I’ll consider it. I’ll give you an answer at 
this time to-morrow.” 

“That’s perfectly satisfactory. We’ll carry your campaign 
for you. I see from your talk you’re a strict party man.” 

“Yes, the government of this country can only be run 
by parties, each advocating its party principles. The best 
government in the world for a republic is a strong party rule 
that knows exactly what it wants and how to get it. Strong 
parties are the salvation of this nation. I am opposed to this 


434 BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 

direct primary for state and national officers. I’ll give you 
my answer at this time to-morrow.” 

After the visitors were gone Jim called Red Barth over the 
’phone. “This is your last night in the city for some time. 
Come over and have supper with us.” In a few minutes Red 
appeared; but not the Red of other days. His step was 
springy, his eye bright, his hair neatly combed, and he wore 
clean clothes of fashionable cut; he looked like a man who had 
never even known dissipation. 

“You go to-morrow morning?” said Mary after they had 
supper. 

“No, I go to-night on the next train. I’m due to arrive in 
California on Friday morning. When I arrive in ’Frisco 
Red Barth dies a natural death. There will be no mourners, 
no obsequies, no publicity of the demise; an individual will 
disappear from the face of the earth, vanish into space, leav¬ 
ing no trace of his worldly existence behind. Another in¬ 
dividual will appear as if by magic and go ahead with his 
daily routine as if he had always been a resident of San 
Francisco. Ernest Alden will be his name. I’ve my 
Eastern university diploma and my certificate of admission to 
the bar in my old home state which will admit me out on the 
coast within a few days after I arrive. I’ve found one of my 
classmates, a very capable lawyer, and I go into practice with 
him.” 

“We’ll miss you in our Sunday-school,” said Mary. “That 
class of boys needs a man teacher and you just fitted in there.” 

“Yes, and I’ll miss my Sunday-school and my class of boys, 
too. They were an inspiration to me and so was all the school 
and the church. The church in the country is the ideal 
church. However, I’ve got my church membership card and 
I’ll turn it in down there as soon as I arrive.” 

“We’ll drive you down to the depot,” said Jim as Red was 
leaving after supper. The train was just pulling in as they 
got to the depot. “Now don’t forget where your strength 
comes from,” said Jim earnestly as they shook hands at part¬ 
ing. 


BIG JIM ALBRIGHT 435 

“I will not,” said Red as earnestly. “I’m trusting in God 
with all my heart and soul. Fm praying morning, noon, and 
night and He’s the power that’s sustaining me. My faith is 
my life now.” The train pulled out and Red Barth, the dope 
fiend, had passed from earth, to be known no more forever. 

Five days later a letter arrived and as Mary opened it a card 
fell from the letter inside. She picked it up. It was neatly 
engraved and the inscription on it was: “Ernest Alden, 
Lawyer, Sherlock Building, San Francisco.” 

“We’ll call Louise and all go out and have dinner with the 
folkses and talk over this governorship,” said Jim next morn¬ 
ing as they sat at breakfast. Louise came in answer to the 
’phone call. She had been a beautiful girl, even in the old 
morphine days, but the few months’ stay with the sisters and 
the complete elimination of the morphine had changed her to 
a radiant girl. She was of a type that was strikingly indi¬ 
vidual in every particular. Even her clothes took on an in¬ 
dividual becomingness when she put them on. In a minute 
she had laid aside her wraps and plunged into the dishwashing 
with Mary. 

The family folks and Reverend and Mrs. Story were 
gathered for dinner. Jim told them of the offer of the delega¬ 
tion. “Now what’s the decision?” he asked. 

“With an offer of help like that you should take it,” said 
Judge Albright. 

“Take it,” said John Morton. 

“Take it,” said Reverend Story. 

“Take it,” said his mother and Mrs. Morton and Louise. 

“And you?” said Jim, turning inquiringly to Mary. 

“Take it,” said Mary. 

“I’ll take it,” said Jim. “It’s unanimous.” 

That evening the leading newspaper of the state carried the 
broadly spread headline: “Big Jim Albright to run for Gover¬ 
nor. His nomination and election conceded.” 


THE END 
























































SEP 11 1924 































































































